Bafana Bafana coach Hugo Broos says if you don’t play soccer regularly, you will lose the rhythm of the game.
And once jy van die beat af is, then you need some time to get back into it. For this reason, Broos says, he once again left out Percy Tau from his Bafana Bafana squad for their African Cup of Nations qualifiers against Uganda tomorrow and South Sudan next week.
Needing at least two points from the last two Group K matches to qualify for next year’s tournament in Morocco, Broos again opted not to include Tau, who was once the groot ster of the national team.
The 30-year-old last started a match for Bafana Bafana in a World Cup qualifier against Nigeria in June.
Playing off the bench for Egyptian club Al Ahly, Broos says of not including Tau: “For all the players it’s the same… my choices are much more difficult than two-three years ago.
“Sometimes I have to drop a player that I like to keep with me, but it’s not possible because I can only select 23 players. Even a player like Percy – for the moment it’s not possible, because Percy doesn’t play in his team.
“On my way over to the press conference I was having a chat with the physical [strength and conditioning] coach and maybe you don’t understand it, but it’s a fact that when you don’t play you lose the feeling, you lose the rhythm of the game.
“When you play at this level… with all respect, this is not PSL.
“You can ask him [Tau], he was at Afcon - those are very tough, intensive games, and when you don’t have the rhythm of those games, it’s very difficult.
“So with Percy, okay Percy is Percy and he’s a very good player. But even for him, it is very difficult to play the role in the team that we expect of him. With all the critics in the past, I’ve protected him and I still protect him... sometimes people ask too much of him.
“I feel people think with Percy in the team, he will score and this and that… it’s not going like that. It was a difficult choice... but I have full confidence in the players that I selected.”