The two teams will be battling it out in the quarter-finals of the Women’s Africa Cup of Nations.

South Africa are the firm favourites to advance to the last four of the competition, but they are excepting nothing less than a tough outing this evening.

The coach, Desiree Ellis, stressed the importance of delivering their best performance this evening, despite the injury to the key player, Thembi Kgatlana.

“When we selected the squad for the tournament, we selected a squad for every eventuality in the competition and that eventuality is now,” Ellis said.

“There are obviously games in between games, so we have to make sure we maintain our form. We must keep working on planning and preparing for the next game.

“We put a plan in place and it is now up to the players to execute that plan.

“It’s the big one. It’s a quarterfinal and there is no second chance. This is the game where you’ve got to give it your all to make sure that we reach our objective, which is obviously to qualify for the World Cup.”

Thursday’s quarter-final at Stade Prince Moulay Al Hassan kicks off at 22:00.

Morgan Piek/OFM Sport