Bafana Bafana midfielder Siphiwe Tshabalala has offered an apology to the nation following the national team’s first round exit from the Chan tournament.

“It is very disappointing that we are out of the tournament being the hosts,” Tshabalala admitted.

“We were hoping to advance to the quarterfinals and go all the way to the finals. So we are very disappointed that we lost to Nigeria.

“They had their chances and took them, we did our best in terms of creating scoring chances but their goalkeeper was one of the best players on the park and denied us numerous times. We are not happy that we conceded three goals.

“Personally I would like to apologise to the nation on behalf of the team for not going through. We did everything we could but it was not good enough on the day. We took the game to them, attacked them very well but they were solid. They got one move and they punished us, and then the penalty that killed us.”

Tshabalala, who earned his 86th cap against the Super Eagles, added: “It is very sad that we find ourselves here, but we have to move on and be strong mentally.

“It is always disappointing when we don’t deliver especially with the nation rallying behind us. We cannot point fingers at anybody but we need to forge ahead, hopefully we will be a better team going forward.

“It is honestly hurting – we are hurting and we know the nation is also hurting, and we are not proud of not doing well but we just have to apply ourselves better in future.” Story from kickoff.com