South Africa national team coach Hugo Broos believes his charges delivered a better performance and could have beaten Nigeria in the 2023 Afcon semifinal clash on Wednesday.

Bafana Bafana lost the match 4-2 on penalties after playing a 1-1 draw at the end of extra time.

The Super Eagles opened the scoring in the second half through William Paul Troost-Ekong’s effort from the spot before Teboho Mokoena grabbed an equaliser, also from a penalty, to force the game into extra time.

“I think we were the best team in the first half, we had the best chances,” Broos said after the match, as cited by Goal.com.

“Nigeria didn’t have [even] one chance [in the first half]. No! Nothing. [In the] second half, they had a few chances and scored.

“But then we changed something tactically and came back but two minutes before the end of the 90 minutes we had three chances again.”

The gaffer added: “Football can be hard; When you see the performance of my team today and then there are penalties and you lose the game! You’re not in the final, it’s hard to accept that because we played a very good game.

“So if we could score there, it’s us going to the final and not Nigeria, that can happen in football. It’s a big disappointment for everyone because we feel that we played a very good game that we played a very good Afcon.”

South Africa will now face DRC in the third/fourth playoffs.