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SAFA need to smell the coffee, says Ngcongca

Cape Town - Mamelodi Sundowns defender Anele Ngcongca says the South Africa Football Association (SAFA) are the ones to be blamed for Bafana Bafana failing to qualify for big tournaments.

Shakes Mashaba's charges failed to qualify for the upcoming 2017 Africa Cup of Nations as well as the 2014 FIFA World Cup held in Brazil.

Ngcongca plied his trade overseas before returning to South African shores during the off-season with Kaizer Chiefs and Sundowns vying for his services. However, the defender went chose to play under Pitso Mosimane after having been mentored by the 52-year-old during his time as Bafana Bafana coach.

The defender believes the problem with Bafana Bafana lies with the association and urges SAFA to solve the problem from the 'bottom'.

"We only have ourselves to blame for failing to qualify because we threw away games like Gambia at home [0-0] and the match away to Mauritania [1-3]," said Ngnongca of South Africa's failure to qualify for the Nations Cup as quoted by KickOff magazine.

"You don't expect to go to the Nations Cup when you cannot win those kinds of games.

"There is a lot of work that still needs to be done if World Cup qualification is to become a reality.

"Instead of look at the bigger picture of going to the world cup, we need to look at the bottom where it all starts. We need to wake up as a nation.

"The football association needs to smell the coffee because we now have this disease of only wanting to host tournaments, which is not good.

"We really need to work hard to bring back the glory days of South African football and emulate the team of 1996.

"We can only do that by working hard and stop mumbling and thinking that going to the World Cup is going to be a walk in the park, yet we failed to even to the Nations Cup."

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