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Johannesburg - Bafana Bafana coach Pitso Mosimane has taken unprecedented steps in trying to avoid a repeat of the soccer team's 2010 failure to qualify for the finals of the African Nations Cup.
High on the list of priorities introduced by the coach was forging an agreement with the PSL to cancel all matches 10 days before the final qualifying game against Sierra Leone next Saturday.
This was in order to set up an extended preparation camp for this period.
However, the clubs of the six overseas-based players in the Bafana squad have shown no sympathy for Mosimane's efforts to ensure a place for South Africa in next year's Nations Cup.
In keeping with FIFA's regulations, the clubs have put a spoke in the coach's wheel and refused to release their players before the weekend's fixtures.
Bafana spokesman Matlhomola Morake confirmed on Wednesday that Siboniso Gaxa (Lierse FC, Belgium), Bongani Khumalo (Reading, England), Anele Ngconga (Racing Genk, Belgium), Dayon Claasen (Lierse), Thulani Serero (Ajax Amsterdam) and Bradley Grobler (Goztepe Izmir, Turkey) would all be in harness only by Monday or Tuesday.
"We've made arrangements to have them all here by Monday, but in some instances there could be a rush after Sunday's fixtures and this could mean a day's delay," said Morake.
However, he reiterated that Mosimane believed the extended camp was a worthwhile exercise even without the overseas players joining in for the first four or five days.
Bafana are currently a point behind sectional leaders Niger going into the last programme of qualifiers and their fate is not entirely in their own hands.
If Niger beat what is expected to be a youthful, under-strength Egyptian side, they will be assured of winning their qualifying group and with it a place in the Nations Cup Finals.
In such an eventuality, Bafana will have only an outside chance of qualifying as one of the two best-placed group runners-up even if they beat or draw with Sierra Leone.
