The senior national women's team have been without stable leadership since the exit of Dutch coach Vera Pauw in August last year, with former captain Ellis having held the reins in the interim.
More than a year later, SAFA have made no headway in their quest to find a replacement, with CEO Dennis Mumble stating that a new meeting with the "task team" is on the cards to re-analyse their list of candidates.
"We are going back to the technical committee now, and we need guidance from them as to what we do next," said Mumble on Tuesday.
"I'm looking for a time when people are available in the next few weeks, so that we can go back and get some better direction as to which way to go now.
"The hold-up is the candidates that the technical task team, which is responsible for the appointment of the coach, had put forward. Neither one of those coaches are available, so that's why I have to go back for a new mandate from them."
Mumble was subsequently quizzed on whether Ellis has done enough to convince the technical committee that she is indeed the best candidate, having led the team to the COSAFA Cup before picking up an individual honour at the recently held SA Sports Awards.
"That's something I need to get guidance from them [task team] on, and she [Ellis] must also still present her technical report, and then we'll take it from there once we've discussed it with the technical task team," he added.
"These are things that become part of the consideration and this technical task team would have to take that seriously, there's no doubt about that.
"So this is what we plan to go to the task team about, asking them to please give us a new mandate. If that person becomes Desire then we will do that fairly quickly.
"But they gave us a list to work from and that's what we've been doing. Unfotunately it's not been successful so we'll have to regroup with them to give us proper guidance in the next couple of weeks."