Banyana Banyana vice-captain Refiloe Jane is delighted that the 2018 Cosafa Women’s Championships tournament is being played in the Eastern Cape.
Jane said the national women’s side was diverse, so it was important that their matches were moved around SA’s provinces.
The Cosafa Women’s Championship, in its sixth year, will be played at Wolfson and Gelvandale stadiums, starting on Wednesday and finishing on September 22.
Banyana are the defending champions, having also won in 2002, 2006 and in 2008.
Midfielder Jane, 26, said everything was on track and the team was ready to take on all comers.
“The players are happy, the management is also happy.
“We thank Sasol and Safa for helping us with the preparations,” she said.
“We have never played in PE before, so I guess it’s a good feeling for the people of PE to have a chance of seeing Banyana Banyana in action because we are a diverse nation.”
There are 12 teams in the competition and Banyana have been drawn in Group A alongside Botswana, Madagascar and Malawi.
The national side take on Madagascar in their opening fixture.
The Vaal University of Technology player said winning their first match was key.
“Going into the tournament, like any other team we want to win it,” Jane said
“The teams coming in also want to win.
“Playing Madagascar in our first match, it’s important for us to win – that way we will ease the pressure from the other teams.
“We don’t know much about Madagascar, but we know they can be physical at times and they will also be coming out guns blazing at us because they want to win.”
Jane captained the Banyana side that lifted the trophy last year and said defending the title starting next week would not be an easy task as the competition was tough.
“All we have to do is stay focused and do what we have to, to win the tournament again.
“All the teams will be coming here to win the tournament, and they are not going to make it any easier for us.
“In return, we will not make things easy for anybody and make sure that we defend the title at home.”
The Banyana team has a mixture of experienced and young players.
Jane believes this will help in terms of the team’s development.
“It’s very important for the team to have new players with a mixture of older players.
“With the experience in the team we are able to guard the young and new players,” she said.
“Working together with them has been easy, because we know that at some point they will be the future of Banyana Banyana.
“So we need to guard each and every young player as much as we can, so that when we leave the team it’s in good hands.”