South Africa v Mexico, 11 June 2010

Kick-Off: 16:00 Local (15:00 BST) Man of the Match: Siphiwe Tshabalala (South Africa) Assistant referees: Rafael Ilyasov (Uzbekistan) Bakhadyr Kochkarov (Kyrgyzstan) Fourth official: Subkhiddin Mohd Salleh (Malaysia) Fifth official: Mu Yuxin (China PR) South Africa vs Mexico was the opening match of the World Cup, held on 11 June 2010. It was described as an "enthralling" and "pulsating" match. South Africa opened the scoring in the 55th minute after Siphiwe Tshabalala scored off a pass through Mexico's defence by Teko Modise. Mexico's captain Rafael Márquez equalised following a corner kick in the 79th minute. In the final minutes of the match, Katlego Mphela almost scored a winning goal for South Africa, but his shot bounced off the post. Tshabalala was named as the man of the match. South Africa's coach, Carlos Alberto Parreira called the result "fair", while Mexico's coach Javier Aguirre stated "we could have won, we could have lost".