Johannesburg - Carlos Alberto Parreira has warned Bafana Bafana of the threat posed by what he describes as "the most daring team" at the Soccer World Cup ahead of their clash with Mexico at Soccer City on Friday.

The two countries kick off the 19th edition of the finals and first ever on the African continent in Johannesburg with plenty of expectation on the host nation.

Never in the history of the World Cup has a home team failed to qualify for the second round, with Parreira's men, the second-lowest ranked nation in the 2010 tournament behind North Korea, desperate to maintain that trend.

Although confident, Brazilian coach Parreira expects a difficult opening against Javier Aguirre's men in front of an expected 90 000 crowd.

"We respect them, but we are not afraid.

"They have their way, we have ours and the good thing about Bafana Bafana now is this team has an identity, they are confident and they want to deliver.

"We want to make this country proud and we are going to give hell to any team we play."

After facing the Mexicans, the hosts must still battle former world champions Uruguay and France in their bid to qualify from Group A.

On Wednesday, an estimated half a million South Africans took to the streets in all major centres blowing vuvuzelas, sounding their car horns and showing their support for the nation.

It was the sort of party atmosphere associated with winning a tournament rather than kicking one off and Parreira said: "In this country football has been sleeping for many years, then suddenly there was a ray of hope with a good performance of the team, the good preparation, the World Cup coming here for the first time and then we had to understand the feelings of the people.

"It's important that this will not contaminate us, in a good sense that is, because we like what we saw. Off course you have to like this kind of support."

Parreira, who heads into the game with his 12-match unbeaten run intact, also revealed he will field an unchanged line-up from the one that took on Denmark in their last warm-up match.

It means that Tsepo Masilela, widely expected to start, loses out to Lucas Thwala at left-back, while Steven Pienaar will lead a five-man midfield with Katlego Mphela playing as a lone striker.?

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