Hugo Broos hits back at ‘nonsense’ amid suspension storm involving Teboho Mokoena against Lesotho

A PEEVED Hugo Broos held court deep in the bowels of Toyota Stadium ahead of Bafana Bafana's 2026 FIFA World Cup qualifier against Lesotho on Friday night.

Bafana will face Lesotho in their seventh World Cup qualifier in Bloemfontein. However, they head into this match amid controversy surrounding Teboho Mokoena, who featured in the 2-0 win over Likuena in the first leg at the New Peter Mokaba Stadium five months ago, despite being ineligible after picking up two yellow cards in previous matches.

The Lesotho Football Association (LeFA) threatened Bafana before the game at Toyota Stadium on Friday, saying they would play the match under protest should Mokoena take part instead of serving his suspension.

“Yes, we are (going to protest). I will start today at the pre-match meeting and warn them that there'll be 46,000 people. They must also respect these small countries because some of them have brains,” LeFA’s secretary-general Mokhosi Mohapi told journalists on Thursday night.

“Teboho should start serving his suspension. Don’t prolong it. Or else, it will be an animal farm, and we don’t want that.”

During his pre-match press conference, Broos was asked what he made of Lesotho’s declaration that they would play the game under protest if Mokoena featured — and he lost his cool.

“Before you go any further, I am not used to commenting on nonsense, so I will not start today,” Broos snapped.

While Lesotho had been quiet on the matter — with rivals Nigeria and Benin insisting FIFA should have acted according to their laws — Mohapi said there was no need for them to lodge a complaint, as the FIFA disciplinary code speaks for itself:

“If a team fields a player who is not eligible to participate (due to suspension, registration issues, nationality, etc.), the match is automatically forfeited. The default result is a 3–0 loss, unless the actual result was even more disadvantageous to the offending team.”

“Do you know the interpretation of that law? It uses words such as ineligible and automatic, which means nobody should trigger it — it should automatically kick in,” Mohapi argued.

“Someone has to apply the rules. Even at your home, when you say your child mustn’t come back after six, who ensures that happens? It’s either you or a mechanism. So, which mechanism has FIFA put in place to address automatic suspension?”

Mokoena was omitted from the final match-day squad against Benin — despite initially being listed — after it was revealed he should not have played against Likuena in the same FIFA window. That was widely seen in football circles as him serving his suspension, but not by Mohapi and LeFA.

“FIFA has rules, and we all have to abide by them — even if it means being reminded,” Mohapi said. “He never sat out any matches. He was supposed to sit out our match.

“Even against Benin, it was just a caution. If we allow people to pick and choose where they want to serve suspensions, football will go into disarray. I know South Africa has a stronger team than us, so if I say ‘cheat, cheat, cheat,’ that doesn’t augur well for anything.”

Bafana are in pole position to qualify for the World Cup finals in North America — the US, Canada, and Mexico — for the first time since 2010, when they were hosts. They lead Group C with 13 points, five ahead of second-placed Rwanda.

However, should they be docked the three points — with a 3-0 defeat imposed — they would need to win all their remaining games to ensure automatic qualification for the World Cup. Mohapi stressed that should be the route Bafana follows, instead of hiding behind the governing body.

“As South Africans, I think you want to say ‘we won the qualifiers fairly, and we didn’t come through the backdoor.’ We shouldn’t do that,” Mohapi said.

“I want you to beat us fairly, and not say you’ll get the protection of FIFA. Don’t act as though you are immune to the very regulations that bind us all together. Let them enforce it now.”