This morning we all woke up disappointed after our hopes of a South African World Cup run look increasingly unlikely. The embarrassing performance rather than the loss have dampened the mood.

The three reds produced by the referee are somehow not dominating fan discussions after the game. Rather, memes and videos are running rampant on social media focusing on everything besides the gameplay itself. The most viral clip features Wilton Sampaio, the Brazilian referee, whose English deserted him when he was asked to explain Themba Zwane's dismissal over the microphone.

You can watch it on X here.

If you watched ninety minutes of the match and came away talking about the official's performance and blaming the red cards for Bafana’s defeat, you were not watching the same game I was.

Warning: Dissecting the game makes for painful reading.

Start with the team sheet, because the warning signs were there before kick-off. Bafana coach Hugo Broos set up in a 5-3-2, a back five with three holding midfielders, picked to keep Mexico out rather than to hurt them.

He left our most dangerous players on the bench. The prime example of this was Oswin Appollis, the winger with six goal contributions in qualifying. This was not the team that got us here and not the team or formation we expected to play.

We qualified playing with width, pace, and a bit of flair, and on the biggest night in South African football in 16 years we set up to defend and play a goalless draw from the first whistle.

And the cautious approach backfired. We gifted Mexico the opener eight minutes in, passing the ball around the back. Sphephelo Sithole took a heavy touch in his own half, Erik Lira robbed him, and Julián Quiñones rolled it through Ronwen Williams's legs. The earliest goal in a World Cup opener since 2006.

We set up not to concede, and conceded in nine minutes, and played the game as if the score was 0-0. At some point you expect the game plan had to change and to go for it.

The numbers sadly reflect this. South Africa had three shots all night for a combined 0.07 expected goals (xG), against Mexico's sixteen shots and 1.41 xG. Mexico had 20 touches in our box. We managed two in theirs. Two.

The only bright spot was Ronwen Williams. He produced a brilliant one-handed save from Raúl Jiménez before the break, and he is the only reason it finished 2-0 and not 4-0. When your goalkeeper is comfortably your best player at a World Cup, that is a verdict on the ten men in front of him.

Then there was the indiscipline and poor decision-making, and here I have the least sympathy. Sithole, already at fault for the goal, brought his man down as the last defender on 49 minutes for a straight red. Then Zwane, a substitute, threw an arm at Roberto Alvarado off the ball on 84 minutes, with the team already down to 10 and pushing forward. That is the moment you protect your teammates. He did the opposite. Both red cards were self-inflicted.

Broos said his side were only under real pressure for the first twenty minutes (which is understandable facing the hosts in the opening game), and that after that they "had the ball and played well". That is not what the numbers, or our eyes, saw. Mexico looked extremely comfortable throughout the game – we offered 0 threat (sorry, 0.07xG).

Sixteen years we waited for this stage, and we walked onto it afraid. We looked as if we had resigned ourselves to defeat the minute we walked onto the pitch. There is of course some sense to being compact and robust when playing a better team, but you need to offer a threat and play your way. This we did not do and I hope we can give a better account of ourselves when we face Czechia on 18 June.

But at least we can laugh at the memes.