Teboho Mokoena says the real Africa Cup of Nations tournament starts now for Bafana Bafana after they sealed their place in the last-16 of the competition.

South Africa secured their place in the knockout stages after they edged Zimbabwe 3-2 in the final group game at the Marrakech Stadium on Monday.

The victory saw them finishing second in Group B behind Egypt.

They will meet Cameroon in the last-16 round at the Al Barid Stadium in Rabat tomorrow (kick-off is at 21:00).

“We’re happy as a team to go to the next round, I think the real tournament starts now,” Mokoena told the media as per iDiski Times.

“I think we have to improve, we have conceded so many goals already, so yeah, we need to improve on that, at least we’re scoring, so that’s good.”

While he stated there’s no preference for Cameroon or Ivory Coast, he went on to state that there were nerves when the Warriors netted their second equaliser.

“We got nervous when they scored the second one, but we scored [again] and they put in numbers in front, we panicked a bit, we needed to be calmer on the ball because when we’re in control we play so much better, when you play too many long balls it’s not our game. We need to improve on that and move forward into the knockout stages.

“That’s why I said the real tournament starts now; it’s going to be tough now but we’re looking forward to it.”

This article was first published by The Citizen.

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