Desiree Ellis was proud of the way her players turned around a difficult WAFCON to secure their place in the quarterfinals.
After kicking off with a 2-1 loss to Tanzania, the team managed a 2-2 draw with Ivory Coast.
Thembi Kgatlana then scored the only goal of the game against Burkina Faso on Tuesday to secure a crucial 1-0 win.
Ivory Coast’s 2-1 victory over Tanzania in the other Group B match saw Banyana secure second place and a knockout clash with hosts Morocco.
“I said it was going to be a tough one, and we made it a little bit difficult for ourselves. We scored early and stopped playing,” Ellis said in The Citizen.
“You’ve got to give credit to the players though, it wasn’t pretty and sometimes it doesn’t have to be pretty. Defensively we were organised and I think we had one or two chances that could have put the game to bed. But I thought the team played very well.”
“It’s not how you start, but how you finish,” added Ellis. “The fightback shows what this team is made of, and we keep working on being better, and that’s all we can do.
“Now the games are coming thick and fast, there’s no margin for error. We have also shown that we can grind out results.
Read: ‘The next match is a must-win game’ – Banyana Banyana head coach Desiree Ellis
“I think in 2018 we played probably the best football of the tournament and we didn’t win it. In 2022 we mixed it up, so we’ve learned that you can’t play pretty all the time and that’s what people expect from Banyana Banyana. But we will take it step by step and day by day.”