oldies
Some of South Africa’s triumphant team of African Nations Cup champions have been described as too old, and now they must take on a young team of magicians from Brazil
SOCCER: Andrew Muchineripi
BRAZIL are the benchmark by which national football teams are judged and at the FNB stadium on Wednesday evening it will be the turn of South Africa to face the ultimate test.
The Nelson Mandela Inauguration Challenge has been billed as a clash of titans, a showdown between the champions of Africa and the champions of the world.
But behind the hype, the match represents the greatest challenge to national coach Clive Barker and the footballers who became national heroes just two months ago by lifting the Nations’ Cup.
Bafana Bafana conquered Africa at the first attempt, defeating Cameroon, Angola, Algeria, Ghana and Tunisia to succeed Nigeria as holders of the most prized trophy on the continent. But once the euphoria of victory had subsided, the doubters were back in business claiming Nigeria would have crushed South Africa had they defended the title.
Furious with President Mandela for taking a firm stand following the hanging of nine minority rights activists, Nigerial military ruler General Sani Abacha pulled the Super Eagles out of the tournament at the last minute.
Another common cry of concern was that the South Africa team was too old and too slow with captian Neil Tovey (33) singled out as a footballer whose time had passed.
Others on or close to the 30 mark are midfielders Doctor Khumalo and John ”Shoes” Moshoeu, and forward Mark Williams, two-goal hero of the Nations’ Cup final triumph over Tunisia.
The Black Prince of South African football, Jomo Sono, has jumped on the bandwagon, saying places must be found for younger players after the Brazil match.
But if the ”golden oldies” perform as well against Brazil as they did throughout the Nations’ Cup, they cannot be dropped. Besides, the queue of young pretenders is not exactly kilometres long.
The age issue has been heightened by the fact that Brazil are bringing a squad containing Bebeto (32), Aldair (30) and 16 magicians, the oldest of whom required just 24 candles at his last birthday party.
Mario Zagalo took over as coach soon after Brazil won the World Cup a record fourth time in 1994 and quickly realised that most of the team would be too old when it came to defending the title.
So he drafted in the pick of the young crop, who last month humiliated four-time African champions Ghana 8-2 near Sao Paulo with substitute Marques scoring a second-half hat- trick.
A Ghanaian team including Leeds United forward Anthony Yeboah must still be wondering what hit them in the second half as Brazil scored six times in a display of lightning speed and one-touch passing.
One Ghanaian was carried off unconscious trying to prevent a goal and another was sent off after a kamikaze takle on Juninho, the only member of the victorious team not coming to South Africa.
European clubs are not obliged to release players for friendly matches, so Zagalo has been deprived of of Juninho from Middlesbrough ad Roberto Carlos and Caio of Inter Milan.
”I am bringing to South Africa a team for today, and tomorrow,” grey-haired Zagalo (63) says. ”This is a different team to the one that won the World Cup.
”We played the way we had to play in the United States and we won. Now we have changed things and we are playing the football we think we should be producing.”
Barker welcomed the eight-goal destruction of Ghana, saying it would serve as a red light. ”But we will have home advantage and I do not believe we will panic and fall apart in the face of exceptional skills.”