Bafana Bafana - bankrupt in all regards

If Bafana Bafana was a business, it would have long filed for bankruptcy.

In fact, Bafana is indeed bankrupt as we speak. There’s associational bankruptcy, managerial bankruptcy, coaching bankruptcy, skills bankruptcy, goal scoring bankruptcy, defending bankruptcy… need I go on?

But, and this is a big but, unlike any other badly performing business, Bafana’s leadership — SAFA — does not have the decency to accept that it has failed, and create opportunities for new people with fresh ideas to take over.

Although they have done some good, their wrongs are too many to even begin to mention.

We appreciate that they managed to pull the 2010 stunt, and for that we will forever be grateful, but we are not indebted.

A great guy I used to know back when I was organizing gigs at Wits University/Technikon, used to say that we must always strive to “leave people on a high, so they come back the next time we do another gig.”

The success of the 2010 bid was a good exit opportunity for SAFA’s ill performing bunch, but they failed to grasp it. Their pupils turned into Rand signs, and that is all they have ever been interested in since the announcement, rewarding themselves with hefty bonuses and waiting for more.

The soccer loving people have complained and called for their heads but all in vain. Can’t SAFA see from the stadium attendance at Bafana games that the people have had enough of their mafia style of running our football? I think they do, and clearly they don’t care.

At this point, the only hope we have for our football to be saved is for God to intervene on our behalf. Whenever I’m watching a Bafana game, I always hold this silent prayer: “God, please RID us of all these people who are suffocating the development of our soccer in their pockets.”

But one man’s prayer is probably not enough and unlike SAFA, I admit that I need help. If we could organize ourselves as soccer fans and patriotic South Africans, choose a day where we would gather at any central stadium and hold a very long praying session, I’m sure God will deliver on our wishes.

Unlike the disbandment of the Scorpions, I have a feeling the disbandment of SAFA would be less opposed.

I like Benni McCarthy because he stopped complaining, and designed his own game plan for dealing with SAFA. He has figured out that the most important thing to these individuals is their “status,” and not the national team’s performance. They probably use him to sell their product, so they need him. Yes, I mean exactly that, SAFA needs him, not South Africa (well, depending on his attitude).

They probably boast during some of their FIFA presentations and go like:

“Eeerrr…we took South African soccer from the doldrums, after a harsh history of apartheid, and turned our football into one of the most competitive in Africa. We now have players like Benni McCarthy doing exceptionally well in one of the top leagues in the world”

(Applause)

“Thank you”

I bet my old Bafana t-shirt (the Kappa) that Benni figured this out and he is using it to his advantage. How else would these guys explain to FIFA that their management skills are so pathetic, they cannot even recruit the only player who is “visibly” performing well in Europe. They don’t want to be exposed, so they are willing to kiss Benni’s butt all the way to Zürich if that is what it takes.

Pardon me for not providing any clue about how I suggest God should rid us of these individuals. But I’m confident that He or She (for the sake of appeasing feminists) cannot fail or struggle to be heard like we all do.