In Group K of the 2025 Africa Cup of Nations qualifications, South Africa and South Sudan will square off for three vital points on Tuesday at the Juba Stadium.
Both teams will be eager to get back to winning ways in this match because they were unable to emerge from their respective initial matches with a victory.
At the Loftus Versfeld Stadium on Friday night, South Africa defeated Uganda in a dramatic 2-2 draw that saw them steal a hard-fought point from the jaws of defeat.
Hugo Broos's team didn't waste any time in taking the lead with to goals from Lyle Foster and Denis Omedi, who scored quickly after. With practically the last kick, Thalente Mbatha restored parity after Mato Kassim had completely changed the course of the match.
Although many people had the Bafana Bafana finishing first in their qualification group, their performance versus Uganda was much below what was expected of the former African champions.
After losing to eventual runners-up Nigeria in the AFCON semi-final in February, South Africa had won nine games in a row across all competitions thanks to Mbatha's late equalizer last time out.
Except for significant competitions, Tuesday's visitors have not triumphed in competitive matches played on enemy soil since they narrowly defeated Liberia 2-1 in March 2023.
South Sudan's dismal 2024 campaign came to an end on Thursday at Stade Alphonse Massemba-Debat as they were defeated by Congo by a score of just 1-0.
After falling behind to Massanga Matondo's opening goal in just 12 minutes, Nicolas Dupuis's team never really appeared to be able to catch up in Brazzaville.
As a result, The Bright Stars have only won one of their last 12 games in all competitions and have already lost five of their games since the start of the year.
More concerningly for South Sudan, they have performed poorly on both sides of the field during that time, scoring only six goals and allowing an alarming thirty goals to be scored against them.
With five consecutive AFCON qualifying group finishes at the bottom, Tuesday's hosts will need to improve swiftly if they hope to advance to the tournament proper for the first time ever.
