Bafana Bafana stunned Tunisia with a 2-0 defeat in an international friendly in Tunis on Wednesday night.
Benni McCarthy and Tyrene Arendse scored both goals in the second and 81st minutes respectively.
The result augurs well for the Stuart Baxter-led South Africans, who will visit the Democratic Republic of Congo next month for the World Cup and African Nations Cup 2006 qualifiers in Germany and Egypt respectively.
Baxter’s boys played well and dictated terms against the highly-rated African Nations Cup champions throughout the first half.
The Tunisians are rated sixth in Africa and 36th in the world while Bafana Bafana occupy the seventh and 41st spots on the respective rankings.
Baxter, who is still in the process of trying to combine a solid and winning combination for both the big assignments, gave all the new players a chance to taste international football.
He introduced Rowen Fernandez for Hans Vonk in the goalkeeping department in the second half and also rested McCarthy, Delron Buckley, Steven Pienaar and Benedict Vilakazi, bringing on Thando Mngomeni, Lance Davids, Elrio Van Heerden and Arendse.
All the players who were substituted did a marvellous job closing down the Tunisians, who seemed to run out of ideas inside the penalty box. In fact, credit should go the Baxter’s rearguard of captain Aaron Mokoena, Mbulelo Mabizela, Bradley Carnell and star defender Nasief Morris.
Vilakazi, Buckley, Pienaar and Benson Mhlongo controlled the middle of the park.
The only player who performed below par was the vastly experienced striker Shaun Bartlett. He missed a handful of scoring chances which could have seen Bafana win by a wider margin.
But he made up for one of those misses when he fed Arendse with a through pass and the Santos player made a golden debut by rattling the net with a well-taken strike.
Davids was sent off for a rough tackle on the stroke of fulltime.
Both teams thrilled the sparse crowd and were well behaved, although Mokoena was booked for an infringement in the 65th minute.
Fernandez, the Kaizer Chiefs goalkeeper, did make a save, thwarting a Tunisian striker in the 71st minute. – Sapa