Hugo Broos has revealed his reasoning for leaving Tshegofatso Mabasa out of his most recent Bafana Bafana squad.
Broos named a provisional 36-man squad which has been trimmed to 23 players to face Nigeria and Zimbabwe in World Cup qualifiers in June.
Mabasa was crowned the DStv Premiership’s top scorer this past season with 16 goals.
But Broos opted to select Themba Zwane, Iqraam Rayners, Percy Tau, Oswin Appollis, Elias Mokwana, Relebohile Mofokeng, Patrick Maswanganyi and Lyle Foster ahead of the Orlando Pirates attacker.
Speaking to SABC Sport on Thursday, the Bafana boss admitted that he chose Rayners ahead of Mabasa as the Stellenbosch striker, who netted 15 goals this season, played well in his previous Bafana outing against Algeria in March.
Broos said: “We had a bad experience with Mabasa two years ago. I had to change him after 35 minutes and everybody said it was a scandal.
“For me, I don’t think I have to take him now because I also have Iqraam. Iqraam also scored 15 goals, it’s one goal difference so I give the confidence to Iqraam right now.
“It was a decision between him [Rayners] and Mabasa. But Iqraam did very well in the game against Algeria and I gave him the confidence no.
“We will follow Mabasa next season. Let’s hope he continues what he did, scoring goals in the last four months. Then we will have another striker.”