Pretoria - The upcoming 2014 FIFA World Cup qualifying clash between Bafana Bafana and the Central African Republic (CAR) has been brought forward to Saturday, 8 June.
The match that was initially scheduled to be played on Sunday 9 June is however still going to be played at Stade Ahmadou Ahidjo in Yaoundé, Cameroon. Kick-off is at 4pm South African time.
Again, the world football governing body, FIFA has also announced that they will handle Bafana’s two upcoming 2014 FIFA World Cup qualifying matches.
The CAR clash will be handled by Ghanaian officials led by referee Agbovu William Selorm, while the second match against Ethiopia will be handled by Egyptian referee Farouk Mahmoud Mohamed.
The South African Football Association (Safa) announced that Bafana will play an international friendly against Lesotho on Saturday June 1, in preparation of the upcoming two World Cup qualifiers.
The match will be played in Maseru stadium and kick-off is at 6pm.
Bafana coach Gordon Igesund said: “This is a hugely important match for us and we must thank the Lesotho Football Association (FA) for agreeing to the fixture as we struggled to get a warm-up ahead of the two important qualifiers.
“The last time we played a match was in March when we faced the CAR in Cape Town, so this clash against Lesotho will help a great deal with our preparations.
“We wanted to get at least two matches but we could not because there is no FIFA date available.”
After the friendly match, Bafana will then depart to Cameroon on June 4 and the players will remain in the camp in Cameroon before leaving for Addis Ababa on 14 June to face Ethiopia in the second World Cup qualifier on Sunday, 16 June.
“We have to remain in Cameroon to deal with the issue of the high altitude in Ethiopia. Ideally we should be in Addis Ababa at least 12 days or so before the match, but seeing that we are unable to, we have to go in as late as possible, play our match and get out before we suffer from high altitude,” said Igesund. - SAnews.gov.za
