Bafana Bafana vice captain Siyanda Xulu believes South Africa are heading in the right direction under the tutelage of coach Hugo Broos.

South Africa are set to face Morocco in their final Africa Cup of Nations Group K qualifier when the two sides meet at the FNB Stadium on Saturday.

The Turan Tovuz defender has been ever-present in the squad since Broos took over the helm and Xulu has since gone on to feature 11 times under the Belgian coach.

Xulu believes Bafana is on the right track after qualifying for the Afcon tournament in Ivory Coast with one game to spare.

“I have been in different Bafana groups,” said Xulu as per Sowetan Live.

“This group is special because we have young players and we have a coach who has experience and everything is just clear.

“Not that I am trying to criticise the other coaches who were here before, but the fact that now I am more involved makes it easy for me to judge the experiences I have had with Bafana. I feel more important with this current group.

“We’ve been working so hard in the past two years and I think now we are heading in the right direction. I am just one of a few players who are part of the current team who was also involved in the team that didn’t make it to Afcon last time out [in 2021 under Molefi Ntseki]…I know how it felt and I am quite happy now that we were able to qualify.

“It is really disappointing for South Africans not to really appreciate the kind of work the coach has done in the past two years.

“As I said, I was part of the group that didn’t qualify two years ago and I remember the hammering, and now I think we did fairly well with a new team but there is no appreciation.”

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