Bafana Bafana were humiliated … no, they were gutted at the African Cup of Nations in Tunisia. An early exit was expected by the South African public, but not a disgraceful one.
For the players this was the saddest day in their lives, while for the soccer supporters it is what they had hoped for in order to drill it into the South African Football Association (Safa) administrators that they are failing to run the game of billions in the country. Bafana Bafana’s defeat sends Safa back to the drawing board to find out what went wrong and it need not look too far.
The debacle in which the association finds itself is of its own making. First it failed to communicate timeously with players about their national call-up and availability and did not take into consideration their club commitments. Then it went ahead and fired national coach Shakes Mashaba just hours before the team flew to Tunisia, and then appointed a coach who had never achieved much at national, junior or premiership level.
A win from a team already disillusioned about their future was too much to ask. The players may have not voiced an objection to the firing of their coach, but they showed this through the performances they dished up in the Nations Cup.
All the blame for the team’s early exit should be put at the door of Safa. The administrators need to shoulder all the blame for the demise of the once-rising soccer nation of South Africa.
The honourable thing for these administrators would be to follow former Safa vice-president Irvin Khoza’s example and resign.
Khoza took all the flak for firing Mashaba and he jumped ship before the consequences were clear. Questions will now be asked about what went wrong. Who is responsible for this debacle and where to from here? Those who need to answer will find it a hard task, as they have never before been called to account for their actions.
There is no recourse to protect them now. Heads must roll and a new executive should come into being. Fresh ideas are needed for Bafana Bafana to rekindle their former glory while the fans wait to hold their heads high again.
The boys must not take this loss to heart, but should be happy that a great administration will now hopefully be established to run soccer in the country.
The appointment of a new coach is needed to prepare for the qualifiers of the 2006 Nations and World Cup. The best man for that job is Gordon Igesund, who has proven himself in the domestic league by winning three premiership titles with three different teams.
Then communication lines should be opened by the coach and administrators to players in the country and overseas. A new breed of players should be groomed to play in the national team in the future — Safa should have a vision of what the national team should be in 2006.
If all these things can be resolved and mechanisms be put in place to ensure the mistakes do not happen again, then the nation can heal and the glory days of massive support for the national team will return.
But this time round it was right for South Africa not to support the team, in order to put things right, which the administrators have failed to do. To the players, we support you and hope you can once again rise above this mess and make us proud in future games.