Bafana Bafana coach Molefi Ntseki has reflected on the preliminary draw of the 2022 FIFA World Cup qualifiers for CAF on Tuesday evening.
Bafana were drawn into Group G, alongside Ethiopia, Zimbabwe and Ghana, as the top 40 African nations were placed into 10 groups of four teams.
The second round will see a total of 30 teams drop out of the competition, before the top team from each group will play a qualifier to determine the five CAF representatives.
“We are in the top 40, so the expectation is for us to qualify for the top 10 and then to go and make the last five teams to go to Qatar 2022.
Every draw is a tough draw because the expectation is that all these top 40 teams will play to qualify for the World Cup, so we are fully aware of Ghana and their qualities.
We are fully aware of Zimbabwe, our neighbours, and also of Ethiopia that have done very well in their prelims against Lesotho to be at this stage.
So, all the teams that are in our group will get the same respect because they deserve to be at this stage of the qualifiers, and it will be a tough one but we are hopeful and looking forward to a good start in the road to the 2022 FIFA World Cup.”
The opening round of fixtures set to take place in October this year and will reach its completion in October next year, before the play-off matches will decide the qualified teams in November 2021.
