Bafana Bafana coach Hugo Broos is unhappy after his players were denied a chance to feel the Felix Houphouet-Boigny surface ahead of their Group C's World Cup qualifier against Benin on Tuesday evening.
The Cheetahs have no approved venue at home which prompted them to request Ivory Coast allow them to use its facility. However, neither Benin nor South Africa has the chance to train on the match-day venue as required by Fifa.
The Elephants were scheduled to play The Gambia on Monday night which explains why they did not get that chance as required. Coach Broos was left infuriated since that would definitely mean his team would be affected either positively or negatively.
‘We have to follow the rules'
“I have to tell you I’m not satisfied with the decision that we can’t have a pre-match training in the stadium where the game takes place. This is a Fifa rule that every team has the right to have a preliminary training of 60 minutes in the stadium where you play [on the day] before the game,” Broos told the media ahead of the game.
“I understand it because there is another game, but this is bad when people who make the rules don’t follow the rules. Will that have an influence on the game? I don’t know. But I know if [on Tuesday] after the game I’m not at the press conference, there will be a sanction. So we have to follow the rules.
“Where are the rules now? And you will tell me, ‘yes, that’s for both teams'. I don’t think so. I think Benin has already trained in that stadium because they were here before us. So it’s all nice to say, ‘follow the rules, follow this'. We have to follow everything but we have the right to train today [Monday] in the stadium where the match takes place and we can’t. This is not honest and this is not correct,” Broos concluded.
Bafana Bafana top Group C with 10 points and hope to secure another win in their pool to stand a chance of qualifying.
