Coach Desiree Ellis of South Africa is set to collect a big award, only two weeks after he was defeated by head coach Randy Waldrum of Nigeria's Super Falcons, according to Soccernet.ng.
Coach Ellis will receive an honorary doctorate from Cape Peninsula University of Technology in Cape Town, South Africa, on Thursday, April 25, 2024.
The 61-year-old strategist's Banyana Banyana team fell on aggregate to the Super Falcons in the final qualifying playoff, and as a result, Nigeria won the ticket to the Olympics in Paris in the first week of April.
On April 5, the Super Falcons upset the current African champions 1-0 in Abuja. In the rematch four days later, Nigeria managed a goalless draw despite Ellis' optimism about winning the match.
The outcome meant that the Banyana Banyana would miss the Olympics for a second time in a row, which devastated the South African football community.
Ellis is still getting praise for her accomplishments with the national team, despite some demanding that she be removed from her position as Banyana coach.
At the Women's Africa Cup of Nations in 2022, Ellis worked her magic to guide South Africa to their first-ever championship victory.
Then, in the 2023 Fifa Women's World Cup, the former manager of Spurs Ladies created history by leading Banyana to become the first team from South Africa—male or female—to advance to the tournament's knockout stages.
She won the Confederation of African Football Women's Coach of the Year for the fourth time in December, not long after President Cyril Ramaphosa bestowed upon her the Order of Ikhamanga in gold.