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Cape Town - Bafana Bafana captain Thulani Hlatshwayo has recalled the moment he learned he would become permanent captain under Stuart Baxter.
Hlatshwayo, who will lead Bafana at AFCON 2019 in Egypt, spoke exclusively to Sport24 this week when he revealed he was not informed of the captaincy in a conventional manner.
“When previous Bafana Bafana coach Shakes Mashaba was at the helm, the captaincy was rotated. Sometimes Dean Furman and Itumeleng Khune would be the captain and other times I would wear the captain’s armband. Itu was the one who was more experienced than us and he would lead the side most of the time,” he said.
“However, when coach Stuart took over, he said he would speak to the captain in the team, but wouldn’t call him and say, ‘You are my captain.’ So when we went to the first camp under coach Stuart, I was sitting in my room and the coach then made the announcement in a press conference. No one alerted me that there was a possibility of me becoming the full-time captain, and I didn’t know until I saw my Twitter feed buzzing. Since being named Bafana captain, it’s been a lovely road. We have a lot of captains in the team from their respective club sides, which makes my job easier.”
The 29-year-old added that he was confident of the team’s chances in Egypt.
“Many might say that we have to draw against Ivory Coast and Morocco and beat Namibia. But if you want to be the best, you must beat the best. With the group that we have, I’m confident that we will be able to advance to the next stage of the tournament,” he said.
“Even though SAFA told coach Stuart (Baxter) that he doesn’t have a mandate, for us it’s about truly discovering our identity as a team and developing from there. But developing doesn’t mean that we have to go and add a number because we play well away from home. We have noticed that we have managed to collect a lot of points away from home in qualifiers.”
