Not known for an ability to organise its affairs well in advance — if at all — the South African Football Association (Safa) has belatedly woken up to the reality of finding opponents for Bafana Bafana in next month’s pre-African Nations Cup Nelson Mandela Challenge.
The tentative date for the annual game to honour South Africa’s former president has been set down for November 16 or 17 — the final period earmarked by Fifa for international fixtures this year — but locating clues as to who Bafana Bafana’s opponents will be were as difficult as finding a needle in a haystack on Monday.
CEO Raymond Hack said a meeting would be held later in the week to discuss all the implications of the Mandela Challenge — particularly the issue of finding suitably attractive drawcards to oppose Bafana.
”A decision will be taken by the executive whether it is more appropriate to plump for one of the world’s major soccer nations from Europe or South America,” added the Safa CEO, ”or look to the African continent for opponents.”
The problem at hand, however, is that in both instances the sands of time are fast running out of soccer’s hour glass and it might already be too late to promote an occasion that is suitably high-profile to be linked with Mandela and provide Bafana with a searching final dress rehearsal before the African Nations Cup tournament in Egypt early in the New Year.
In the interim, Bafana coach Stuart Baxter, general manager Stanley ”Screamer” Tshabalala, Safa international affairs director Barney Kujane and Bafana press relations officer Gu Gu Marawa all confessed to being in the dark regarding Bafana’s likely opponents next month.
An idea mooted is that one of the African teams who have qualified for the World Cup finals could be lured to South Africa for the occasion.
And, in this respect, only Ghana and Côte d’Ivoire could classify as drawcards.
But after playing in the same World Cup qualifying group as South Africa, it would make little sense for Ghana to return here at this juncture. And Côte d’Ivoire might find it a problem securing the release of their top European-based stars.
That would leave Togo, Tunisia and Angola — not exactly box-office attractions.
Portugal have been mooted as possible opponents, but they seem to be committed, and premier drawcards on the world stage such as Brazil, Argentina, France, England and Germany have arranged matches for next month many moons ago. — Sapa