From the initial misplaced optimism of talking up Bafana Bafana as potential champions, just one bad result now has our national team facing possible elimination from the Africa Cup of Nations as early as Friday.

It was always coming, a bad result that is, after Shakes Mashaba enjoyed an unbeaten run that made us all forget that we were talking about Bafana here: a team who for years had specialised in letting the nation down.

Monday's 3-1 loss to Algeria in the opening Group C encounter was perhaps what we needed, something to bring us back to the reality that, despite Mashaba's rejuvenation of the side since their first qualifier in September, Bafana have deep flaws.

The resurgence of the past four months only served to paper over the cracks, which were cruelly exposed by Algeria in the final 20 minutes or so of Monday's match.

From poor decision-making and finishing, lack of maturity and absence of leadership, Bafana's implosion was no surprise.

It's precisely what was required to remind us that this is a team in transition that, in the first place, should not have been burdened by unreasonable expectations, not least after the misfortune of finding themselves in a group that includes three of Africa's top five sides.

Yet for about an hour on Monday evening, Bafana made it seem as though a new chapter was about to open.

They were by far the better side, making Algeria's Desert Foxes look undeserving of the label of the continent's best-ranked side.

Unfortunately, as pointed out by both Mashaba and Algeria coach Christian Gourcuff, the penalty miss by Tokelo Rantie proved decisive in Bafana's capitulation.

There are lessons to be taken from that, the main being that a penalty at such a big tournament, against such big opposition, must be converted. There's also a lesson in leadership for Mashaba: he should have chosen a designated penalty taker.

While it hurts that Rantie didn't convert it, that alone should not detract from the fact that Bafana played really well, creating other chances that were not taken.

Mashaba, too, erred with his selection and substitutions - why Bernard Parker was kept on the sidelines for the entire game is beyond logic - but the key here is to ensure the same mistakes are not repeated. You have to learn from mistakes.

It's not all doom and gloom for Bafana, with the games against Senegal on Friday and Ghana next week to follow.

The performance in the first 60 minutes against Algeria was encouraging enough to fill me with belief that we can salvage four points from those games. But the realist in me says we should brace for the worst and accept the possibility that our last match against Ghana could be a dead rubber.

Having said that, we should not forget where we come from with this team. Mere qualification was a bonus, and the experience gleaned from the tournament in Equatorial Guinea should come in handy going into the next event, and the 2018 World Cup qualifiers.

Bafana could have done better in their opening match, but unlike their predecessors, they didn't really disgrace the nation.