Football in South Africa
This article is for people who are curious about how football is perceived in South Africa, how the 2010 World Cup will change things in South Africa, why crime won’t be an issue and whether Benni MCarthy will ever play for SA again (all from a South African’s point of view).
Football or soccer depending on where you come from is very big in South Africa. It is played in virtually every school in the country. It is the country’s biggest sport before rugby and cricket.
There is immense talent but like other countries in Africa the infrastructure is poor in most areas and politics always comes to the scene. The soccer league in South Africa is of poor quality; The PSL (Premier Soccer League) is very one dimensional, based on attack, skills and the ability to out-dribble your opponent.
When FIFA announced the world cup would be staged in SA people went mad. Players were looking forward to playing in the worlds premier soccer event at home, Fans were relishing at watching the greats of football in their own backyard and everyone thought how great the World Cup would be for South Africa as a whole but then came the negative publicity SA received in the media - the crime rate is too high, tourists would be scared to come to SA, stadiums wont be ready etc.
The media around the world continue to say that FIFA might move the World Cup to Australia, England or the US. I believe that the world cup will be staged in South Africa. SA has hosted the rugby and cricket world cups which were both successful, SA has hosted the world summit in 2002 and is going to host the Twenty/20 Cricket world cup in September. Crime affected very few tourists during all the World Cups; players and members of the respective national teams were guarded 24/7 and the personal safety of tourists were looked after to the best of the abilities of the government. I believe that the government will employ extra policemen to guard hotels, places of interest and of course stadiums like they did when the country hosed the 2003 cricket world cup.
Although I am starting to doubt whether all the stadiums will be completed in time but i do have faith in the building companies and hopefully another Wembley will be avoided.
Will Benni McCarthy play for South Africa again?
For those of you who don’t know Benni has decided not to play for South Africa until changes have been made within SAFA (South African Football Association) . Benni wants an apology for the way he has been treated by SAFA and wont play again until his demands have been met. He hasn’t performed well in South African colours but he is the best player we have.
I don’t see SAFA apologising. This will make Blackburn fans happy no doubt, as their top scorer will be available in January when the African cup of nations will be on, that is if Benni is still at Blackburn next season.
Ed’s note: Also read this - South Africa seeks to share 2010 World Cup
All the latest football headlines.
Good article mate, welcome to SL.
It’s regrettable to see FIFA push SA through the media like they have recently - supporting them one minute and then talking about alternative the next.
I don’t doubt that South Africa will be ready - West Indies were ready for the cricket World Cup, weren’t they?
But considering that it’s coming after Germany 2006, which was a great world cup for visiting fans, SA 2010 has some standards to live up to, and that might be hard.
As another South African, I’d like to put my spin on things.
Firstly, the World Cup WILL be held in South Africa. FIFA’s comments were just a wake up call to get moving. There is no doubt that the stadia will be ready. Theres just too much at stake for them to be complacent and slow.
The writer states that South Africa has hosted other tournaments (cricket and rugby world cups etc) and goes on to conclude that because of this they are capable of hosting the WC. I don’t think that conclusion can be drawn from those facts because in no disrespect to those other tournaments, they are small fish compared to the Football World Cup which is, perhaps with he exception of the Olympics, the biggest sporting event.
Nevertheless, I still believe they will be ready. It is about time this tournament came to Africa but I doubt, unfortunately, that the tournament will be as great a spectacle as the last 2. That I seriously doubt.
Regarding Benni, there is no doubt that he is by far our best player but his ego is a MASSIVE problem. A player like him can severely affect the morale in the SA camp. He has this belief that when he plays for SA he is untouchable and it seems as if he looks down on the rest of the players. This will be a big call for SAFA and Carlos Parreira. Lets hope they get it right.
I think Benni will play eventually. Safa is starting to realise that they are losing face with the Benni issue. They need to get the country behind the national team and cannot do that if the national team is divided like this. What dissapoints me a bit is the fact that none (or very few) of the other playes seem to stand by Benni. The way I understand the situation is that he ended up in this mess mainly because he wanted to assist them. Wonder what would happen if he should move to a higher profile club (like United, Chelsea, Madrid, Barca)?
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Coming from Cape Town it has been extremely disappointing to see the apathy of some locals to the world cup. Protests and court interdicts followed the announcement of the building of the new Cape Town stadium. It seems that a few locals are totally against any footy taking place and if it does they want to dictate to the local WC organising committee where it should.
Traditionally Cape Town is very fond of rugby and i believe it is these folks that are against the footy. They can get ****.
The WC IS defo happening in South Africa. It might not be like Germany but thats ok. Its Africa and its gonna be awesome. World Cups have been in South America, where the crime rate is not exactly under control (no offence guys) so i dont see what the whole fuss is about crime.
Regards Benni…..SAFA is useless and lets hope Perreira can convince him to come back. The guy is used to playing in a professional encvironment and whenever he gets called up to play for his country its like coming to the circus. Players that are ineligible to play get called up and flights are not booked and there is no transport for players, and then they criticise their best player…what a joke.
[...] SA has hosted the rugby and cricket world cups which were both successful, SA has hosted the world summit in 2002 and is going to host the Twenty/20 Cricket world cup in September. Crime affected very few tourists during all the World … …Sportzia More [...]
The World Cup 2018 will be in Australia Defintly!
It’s going to suck..
‘Football or soccer depending on where you come from is very big in South Africa. It is played in virtually every school in the country. It is the country’s biggest sport before rugby and cricket.’
^That’s so not true. Even though I’d like it to be (If the soccer was on better standard) it’s not.
Nah..It’s Africa and it’s going to be bad..