In what was a keenly anticipated fixture in South African football during the last couple of days, Bafana Bafana will now turn their attention to the first round of the African Nations Championship (CHAN) qualifiers where they will take on Egypt at the Free State Stadium on Sunday afternoon. Kick-off is at 5:00pm (CAT, GMT+2)

The fixture was originally scheduled for Friday, the 28^th of February, however the Egyptian requested a postponement after learning that they would only receive their documents on Friday.

Also, Bafana Bafana will welcome Molefi Ntseki back to the hot seat for CHAN qualifiers, after Helman Mkhalele was ‘recused’ from the team to give priority for Bafana’s 2026 FIFA World Cup qualifiers in the near future.

“After we got information that the South African senior national team coach requested that Helman Mkhalele must be recused from this team because we have the priority of Bafana Bafana playing 2026 FIFA World Cup qualifiers against Lesotho and Benin in a few weeks’ time, we agreed,” SAFA Technical Committee Chairman Jack Maluleke said in a statement.

“Therefore, we as SAFA realized that after the NEC endorsed the name of Molefi Ntseki, we had to check who can replace Mkhalele at this point in time. We thought of him (Ntseki) because he’s the most senior and we requested him to be deployed there on a temporary basis to step in for Helman and he will be assisted by the head coach of the SA U20s (Mdaka).

“Coach Ntseki is there because he’s in the system and we requested him to assist because we needed somebody who can step in because this is an urgent matter.”

The winner between South Africa and Egypt will advance to second round of the CHAN qualifiers which will take place in May 2025.

 HEAD-TO-HEAD

Last five matches played in all competitions

Games

South Africa wins – 3

Egypt wins – 1

Draws – 0