Venue: Royal Bafokeng Stadium Wednesday, June 17th 2009 Kick-Off:19:30

Hosts South Africa face off against New Zealand on Wednesday evening in their second games for the Confederations Cup tournament live on BBC.

Both nations did little in their opening game to suggest they can live up to the tournament's billing as the Festival of Champions. New Zealand were poor in their thrashing to top-ranked Spain, but the headlines that accompanied South Africa's lacklustre draw were unforgiving as coach Joel Santana was again ridiculed for his defensive and inflexible tactics.

South Africa entertained Iraq in the first game of the tournament and although the hosts enjoyed the best of the game, a stubborn Iraqi rearguard action frustrated the home team and the game eventually ended in a rather disappointing 0-0 stalemate.

New Zealand suffered a torrid first game when they were comprehensively beaten 5-0 by a rampant Spain. The Spanish team raced into a 4-0 lead within the first 24 minutes of the encounter, and the New Zealanders can count themselves lucky that the galaxy of starts in the Spanish team rather took their foot off the pedal for the rest of the game.

New Zealand did show though, that they have enough in their locker to compete with both South Africa and Iraq for a place in the semi finals of the tournament.

This is a second chance neither side can afford to pass up. Defeat would eliminate New Zealand, while it would leave South Africa facing the prospect of having to beat Spain to reach the semi-finals.

South Africa coach Joel Santana intends to recall fit-again midfielder Steven Pienaar to add some much-needed creativity to the side after only playing a handful of minutes at the end of the Iraq match. The defence-minded Benson Mhlongo is most likely to make way, while captain Aaron Mokoena should recover from a shin problem.

New Zealand go into this encounter with a full strength squad, including no suspensions after a clean game against Spain that did not even produce a yellow card.

The only injury concern is full-back Aaron Scott, who picked up a slight knock on Monday, with Ben Sigmund on stand-by to make his first appearance since hip surgery in March.

A win is imperative for South Africa if they are to qualify for the semi-finals with Spain coming up in their last group game. After being ridiculed by the press again, coach Joel Santana is sure to have his players fired up and they can take advantage of New Zealand's leaky defence to seal the precious three points.

Dave's Prediction:

South Africa 2 New Zealand 0 @ 6.50 with Canbet