Quinton Fortune celebrates (Allsport).

Manchester United's Quinton Fortune converted a stoppage-time penalty to earn South Africa a 2-2 draw against Paraguay despite the attempts of one of the South Americans to put him off.

Fortune revealed that Francisco Arce, who scored Paraguay's second goal, came up to him and told him he would miss as he waited to take the 90th-minute spot-kick in the Asiad Stadium.

An annoyed Fortune said: "He said to me that I would miss and in a game of football I don't think that's nice.

"I wouldn't do that and I was nervous enough because I had missed my last penalty in Mali.

"I just hit it and it went in. I was so pleased and it is my first goal for South Africa, just in case you couldn't tell by the way I celebrated it!

"I'm delighted that we got the draw and we only really started to play after they scored their second goal.

"We're a bit like Manchester United and we only start to play when we go a goal down.

"All credit to the lads, they kept going and we kept believing in ourselves."

South Africa coach Jomo Sono was delighted for Fortune after that miss during the African Nations Cup in Mali and he said: "He missed his last penalty and he got a lot of flak for that back home.

"But I always believed in him and he has bounced back by scoring the penalty.

"I thought he played very well overall and I was very pleased for him.

"He showed a lot of composure to score that penalty with all the pressure that was riding on it."

Roque Santa Cruz and Arce had given Paraguay a two-goal lead after 55 minutes of the Group B game before Estanislao Struway put through his own net to set up Fortune for his grand finale.

Sono said: "I thought it was a game of two halves really. The first half was theirs and the second half belonged to us.

"We showed a lot of character to come back from 2-0 down and get a draw."

Paraguay coach Cesare Maldini claimed he was not too despondent at seeing his side drop two points in the 90th minute.

"I'm not disappointed," he said. "I was convinced we would win the game when we led 2-0.

"We played well for the first 45 minutes, but after that, even though we managed to get another goal, we stopped playing and that cost us.

"The South Africans were physical and very strong, but at the same time we made a couple of mistakes.

"We didn't keep possession of the ball and so we didn't keep possession of the game.

"I don't think we tired in the second half and I think it was more of a mental problem."

In addition to South Africa's late penalty for a foul by goalkeeper Ricardo Tavarelli on Sibusiso Zuma, Paraguay were denied a spot-kick in the opening seconds when Santa Cruz went down.

Maldini, though, refused to comment on the decisions of Slovakian official Lubos Michel and he said: "I don't want to judge the referee."