Itumeleng Khune called for coffee during Bafana Bafana rout of Seychelles at FNB Stadium

Itumeleng Khune called for coffee during Bafana Bafana rout of Seychelles at FNB Stadium

Bafana Bafana goalkeeper Itumeleng Khune joked and said he asked for a cup of hot coffee during their 6-0 rout of Seychelles over the weekend.

Khune was a peripheral figure as his teammates ran riot at the FNB Stadium and went untested in the entire 90 minutes – at some point he began to watch the action from half-way up the pitch – such was the extent of his inactivity on Saturday.

The 31-year-old has even joked that the he was left in a state of yearning for a warm drink as he braved the cold and wet weather in Soweto.

“I actually asked our kit man if he could bring me coffee, because I was getting cold,” said ‘Itu’ in jest, prior to leaving for Seychelles on Sunday.

“But we didn’t underestimate Seychelles. Yes, they didn’t play their best football under those conditions and we took advantage of that.

“The whole week we had been watering the pitch and we had been preparing very well, so that under any other circumstances or conditions we would still play our brand of football.

“And I’m glad that we managed to show yesterday, as cold as it was – there was nothing we could do to control the weather, but we controlled our display in getting the positive result.”

Having kept three consecutive clean sheets in all of their 2019 Africa Cup of Nations Group E qualifiers thus far, it was also a welcome sight for the Kaizer Chiefs ‘stopper to see six chances being put away, although he admitted that more goals could have been scored.

“We could have scored more, I mean there was a couple of times where we hit the crossbar and where their goalkeeper [Romeo Barra] made some great saves,” he added.

“But it shows great signs going forward that, if we are consistent and we stick to our game-plans, we can always score more goals.

“Yes, we’ve been struggling [with scoring] a lot. Yes, we’ve kept those clean sheets, which is something we’ve always wanted, but we’ve wanted to score goals more than [get] clean sheets.

“The score could end 4-2 or 5-2 as long as we score, if we concede whenever playing against better sides than us. But, for now, it’s a great sign that we are getting goals.

“We will also encourage our strikers to continue, because I was telling them to sit down with Benni [McCarthy], Shaun Bartlett, who’s part of the team now, and ask how they became Bafana top scorers, and it’s in games like these where you take advantage.

“I was telling Percy Tau, if you have to score 10 in one match then do it. If I have to keep clean sheets in 100 or 200 matches for Bafana, I will do it regardless of who we’re playing against.” kickoff.com