A recent soccer clinic in Soweto had former Liverpool F.C. player John Barnes coaching young girls to become the future stars of Africa.

It’s high noon but the skies are overcast in Soweto on this Wednesday afternoon in October. It is business as usual in this urban Johannesburg township but as we approach Meadowlands, it starts to drizzle.
But rain or shine, at the Fiat Sports Centre here, a group of over 40 girls aged between 12 and 14 are oblivious to everything around them. Their eyes are trained on the ball as they make the most of the day out on the field with visiting retired Jamaican-born professional footballer John Barnes.
It’s a soccer coaching clinic with the star and the girls are wearing big smiles and bright red outfits.
The well-maintained field is separated into rectangles so the groups are smaller and easier to manage. Each section has a coach, balls and marking cones for the different skill-building tasks planned for the day.
Barnes pays close attention to the teams, occasionally offering advice to both the coaches and players.
<blockquote>“It is about empowering young girls and making them feel confident about expressing themselves. It is about making them feel confident that there are no barriers that stop them from achieving their goals,” he says.</blockquote>
The former Liverpool Football Club player and English Football Hall of Fame inductee has been playing football for as long as he can remember., so he only knows too well the preoccupations of these young minds.
He moved to England at the age of 12, and joined the professional ranks at 17 when he signed for Watford in 1981. Barnes later moved to Liverpool F.C. in his early 20s where he played for a decade.
Today, in Soweto, he motivates the girls on the field, goading them on to perform better than boys.
“You have to separate football when you talk about it in South Africa, into men’s football and women’s football. Men’s football is really well-advanced, they have huge support, lots of money, great players, but women’s football is just starting out. It is pleasing to see that young girls are now given an opportunity because young girls in Africa are told that they do not play football but they actually do,” says Barnes.
<div id="attachment_37650" style="width: 750px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-37650" class="wp-image-37650 size-large" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/JohnBarnes_GL-1024x683.jpg" alt="" width="740" height="494" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/JohnBarnes_GL-1024x683.jpg 1024w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/JohnBarnes_GL-300x200.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/JohnBarnes_GL-600x400.jpg 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/JohnBarnes_GL-768x512.jpg 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/JohnBarnes_GL.jpg 1654w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 740px) 100vw, 740px" />John Barnes. Photo By Gypseenia Lion</div>
The girls receive coaching as part of the Goal global community initiative by Standard Chartered Bank. In South Africa, the program was launched in Tshwane in April 2015 and has since reached over 6,000 girls. The target for 2018 is just over 3,000 girls between Tshwane and Soweto.
In partnership with Altus Sport, an NGO developing youth and sport, the 2018 Soweto program includes this special interaction with Barnes.
Former Banyana Banyana player, Thando Dlamini, started coaching at the clinic this year. She says some of the girls lack discipline, and stresses how support from family members and the community can go a long way to help.
“You hardly see any of the parents coming to support the girls. I think if they came to the games and watch the girls, they will realize it is not about the misconceptions. The behavior has changed in some of the girls I worked with. Soccer teaches you discipline,” says Dlamini.
The star of the day at the soccer clinic, Mosima Magome, a Grade 8 student, agrees. She says she has been feeling more confident since starting soccer.
“People would always tease me because I am the shortest in class,” she says. The teenager looks up to global icon, Lionel Messi, because “he never quits, even when he misses a goal”.
Commenting on the general lack of interest in skills-building programs, Altus Sport’s Operations Manager Samantha Pennells says local professional sportsmen should give back to the community as well.
“You got a guy from Liverpool, like John Barnes. He is here in the community; it is not his community but he is here giving advice, giving tips. It was not just about sport, it was about life,” she says.
South African football veteran Steve Sekano, a guest at the soccer clinic, and Barnes share jokes on the sidelines.
The former Moroka Swallows Football Club midfielder runs a foundation within the community that aims to get the youth involved in sport. With hopes that sport will keep them out of trouble, Sekano advocates the need for more facilities in the area. He says that as a former professional, it is his duty to give back.
“People ask me why soccer is not the same as when you guys played. I say it is the same. But when you talk about soccer today, you talk about money. Because our players are earning a lot of money today. Those days, we were not earning a lot of money, we were committed. But our players need to up their game; our game must grow,” says Sekano.
<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="alignnone wp-image-37649 size-large" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/JBGirls_GL-1024x683.jpg" alt="" width="740" height="494" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/JBGirls_GL-1024x683.jpg 1024w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/JBGirls_GL-300x200.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/JBGirls_GL-600x400.jpg 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/JBGirls_GL-768x512.jpg 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/JBGirls_GL.jpg 2048w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 740px) 100vw, 740px" />
For Geraldine Matchaba, Head of Corporate Affairs, Brand &amp; Marketing, South Africa and Southern Africa, at Standard Chartered Bank, the corporate world too has a responsibility to prioritize community-based issues. “Those are people who are your future employees, they are your clients and they are future leaders. You have to play a role. It is what we are doing with the Goal program,” she says.
Thoko Phakati, Sports Field Manager, is in charge of operations at the Fiat Sports Centre. The space that used to be a dumping site is now accessible to the community free of charge.
“We believe they also deserve a chance, why is it that only places like the Wanderers Stadium are supposed to look beautiful? So we are doing as much as we can here to give kids a chance. We have people like Steve Sekano who grew up here and became successful but if he were to tell you his story, you will find that he also had challenges growing up,” she says.
Soweto truly is the home of South African football, and the young girls here prove they too can chase a ball for 90 minutes. There is a long conversation to be had about policies that prioritize men over women in sport, but in the meantime, programs such as Goal and footballers like Barnes continue to make sure that new stars are born on the muddy fields of Soweto.
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Giving Girls Goals; Soweto’s Soccer Coaching Clinic

Xavi has just got the ball from Sergio Busquets; Casillas makes the run to the edge of the penalty area as he receives the ball, dribbles past one opponent before playing a through-ball for Zidane, who lays it on for Iniesta on the left wing. Iniesta curls in a cross; Christiano Ronaldo rises at the far post to meet it with a powerful header –goal! The stadium erupts in thunderous cheer with cameras synchronizing in a blinding daze of flashes.
Unfortunately, this is not the commentary for a charity match with legendary players from the upper strata of football. There are no cameras in sight and instead of pristine, beautifully landscaped Astro Turf, we have sandy and rocky grounds.
Representing their icons are Obinna ‘Xavi’, Balo ‘Sergio Busquets’, Tola ‘Casillas’, Dayo ‘Zidane’ and Kola ‘Ronaldo’. We are in Lagos, Nigeria, watching the final game between two under-17 teams in the local league cup. The winner gets bragging rights as well as some products from a local FCMG brand.
Football is an overwhelming moment of beauty, spirit and pride and in the most populous country in Africa, that passion is palpable. Gianni Infantino, FIFA President, who was in Lagos at the maiden edition of the AITEO-Nigerian Football Federation (NFF) Awards this year, summed up this love perfectly.
“I was told that in Nigeria, football is passion, but it is a lie because it is more than that. In Nigeria, I was told that football is love, but it is a lie it is more than that. In Nigeria, I was told that football is a religion, but it is a lie. It is more than that. In Nigeria, football is life,” he says in his opening address to a room full of corporate executives, the upper echelons of power in government as well as the hall of fame of Nigerian football.
<blockquote>“Football is also business; when we can harness it properly, a lot of money can be made for the country through the game.”</blockquote>
The country’s love affair with the sport has blossomed over the years into an obsessive relationship. At a buka (local restaurant) in Surulere, a waiter is nearly slapped by an angry fan when he mistakenly changes the channel from a game between Chelsea and Man U to Soundcity, the indigenous 24-hour music channel that is a favorite of most of its diners.
After a heated exchange, the manager apologizes for the interruption and the game is back on. Commonsense is restored. Although this is a repeat match, the men watch intensely with the same passion and vigor of a live game.
“We found that football is the main pull for customers to our restaurant. They are passionate about football. It has turned into a family. Our customers come from all over Lagos to watch the games and once they are here, they have to eat and drink so it’s a win-win for us,” says Nnamdi Mayowa, owner of the restaurant.
As he speaks, a cheer rings out from outside the restaurant. Hordes of football fans have gathered to also catch a glimpse of the action and as any good football story goes, it all began with the kick of the ball in 1945.
That year, the Nigerian Football Federation was introduced as the governing body for the sport. Nigeria subsequently began participating in Africa’s Challenge Cup in the 1960s. Since then, the national team known affectionately as ‘The Super Eagles’, have had a fair number of successes. They won bronze medals in the 1978 and 1979 African Cup of Nations (AFCON) and in 1980, they won the championship in Lagos.
In 1984 and 1988, Nigeria subsequently captured silver medals in the tournament. Football had come to stay and with it a number of international stars were born and shipped to some of the world’s most successful football clubs with lucrative deals.
Then came the dark years. In 2010, Nigeria finished bottom of their group in South Africa with just one point from three matches after losing to Argentina and Greece and drawing with South Korea. In response, the then President Goodluck Jonathan banned the team from competing in the sport for two years. Then followed their exit at the 2014 World Cup where they lost to France, and a subsequent failure to qualify for the 2015 and 2017 editions of the AFCON. Nigerian football morale was at an all-time low.
Finally, a shimmer of light emerged at the end of the tunnel. The Super Eagles breezed through their group stage of the FIFA World Cup Qualifiers to earn a spot as one of only five African countries to make it to Russia 2018.
They were unbeaten in six matches with four wins and two draws, scoring 12 goals and only conceding four times, an incredible feat that took the team, led by German tactician, Gernot Rohr, to their sixth FIFA World Cup.
For Nigerians of this era, there is no sporting moment more significant than this triumph, especially as it is achieved against a backdrop of a sputtering economy that has gripped the country since the fall in crude oil prices and the Foreign Exchange (FX) fiasco of 2016 and 2017. The 2019 elections are also on the horizon and with it, greater economic uncertainty for Nigerians. The country has been increasingly marred by public dissent reflecting the mounting anger over an absentee president. To make matters worse, Nigeria has more than 300 tribes, making a consensus of any kind at the best of times, almost impossible to reach.
“We call football the unifying factor. When Nigeria is playing everyone comes together, we forget our tribes, we forget our differences, we even forget our religion. We all hug together when we do well and we all sulk together when we lose. Football is also business; when we can harness it properly, a lot of money can be made for the country through the game,” says Akin Alabi, founder of NairaBET, a leader in a wide range of betting opportunities on all sports.
Having attended two World Cups, South Africa in 2010 and Brazil in 2014, Alabi firmly has his eyes set on Russia.
“I want them to get to a quarter appearance. That will be the best-case scenario for me because I do not think we have gotten further than that,” he says.
However, he is quick to point out that this is not Nigeria’s strongest team.
“I think our 1994 team was fantastic. We do not have the caliber of players we had then, but no one has the perfect team out there. This is a national team and not like pro football where you can take money and buy whichever player you want. You have to make do with those that are available from the country you are from. So we are hoping it goes well,” says Alabi.
He believes the prospects of an African country actually bringing back the cup is far-fetched. Countries like Germany for example have a well-oiled football development machine, which helps them churn out a lot of quality players, which any African team cannot match right now.
“The German team is called a German machine for a reason, they have a well-oiled team and continuity. Their manager has been there for years on various World Cups so everything is run professionally. In Nigeria and Africa, when it is time for a match, we just invite players to run and play so that cannot work. We need better development in terms of processes,” says Alabi.
However, Brian Okonkwo is adamant Nigeria will go all the way to the finals. But then again, he would be. As a member of the Nigeria Football Supporters Club, he has dedicated his life to the advancement of the sport that saved his life as a troubled youth.
“When I was younger I used to be in an armed robbery gang and we did a lot of bad things to innocent people. I was on a fast track to jail or death but luckily, someone from my family was able to help me turn over a new leaf by introducing me to football,” says Okonkwo.
He has been present in all Nigeria’s five World Cup appearances in the past.
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“I think we have everything it takes to bring this home for our people, the team simply needs the support of the country behind them and that is our job. We are with them all the way and we need the resources to enable us to do our job,” says Okonkwo.
According to the Club’s National Chairman, Samuel Ikpea, the club will take 1,000 people to Russia to cheer and support the Super Eagles. This means 1,000 visa applications, 1,000 hotel rooms and 1,000 mouths to feed for the duration of the Russia 2018 tournament.
“Football is a passion of the nation and we do this job out of love for the sport. We have been in this business for a long time and we are already sourcing for funds to ensure that we get to Russia. Unfortunately, it is difficult because we have not been able to receive any funds from the Nigeria Football Federation (NFF) or the ministry of sports since this new government came,” says Ikpea.
According to Ikpea, this differs to the previous government who invested $140,000 to help them cover expenses to support the Super Eagles in the last World Cup.
“Teams like Nigeria come into the World Cup and historically something happens. They look great in the qualifiers then everything falls apart, something happens with the federation, somebody doesn’t get paid and now all of a sudden this team is in disarray going into the competition,” says Marcus Dawson, a sports commentator for Metro TV.
In the absence of adequate infrastructure, and in spite of the paucity of training facilities, football is played on streets, paths or fields. The potential of the sport has not been realized in the country due to the lack of support from corporate organizations that only see football as a CSR initiative instead of a lucrative business venture.
As a result, the NFF is fighting to ensure the team has adequate resources to efficiently compete in Russia. According to Amaju Pinnick, President of the NFF, the organization is working on generating $2.8 million for the Super Eagles’ participation in the games.
“Failure is not an option in the FIFA World Cup and we need to come together to ensure we provide the team with everything they need to make it through,” says Pinnick.
The organization receives support from private organizaitons like Aiteo who have a focus on developing the quality of football in Nigeria. So far, Aiteo has paid the sum of $600,000 and $890,000 to cover its contractual obligation of providing support to the technical crew of the Super Eagles for the whole of 2018, well beyond the World Cup, according to Deputy Managing Director, Francis Peters.
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This however pales in comparison to investment in sports by their European counterparts. In a little more than a decade, Germany has invested nearly $1 billion in its youth soccer programs, with academies run by professional teams and training centers overseen by the national soccer association, the Deutscher Fussball Bund, according to a report in The New York Times.
Also of grave concern was the issue of the selection process for the team, which sparked widespread debates across the country. Like the case of Sone Aluko, a professional football player, who is a striker for Fulham FC but could not make it on the coveted team shortlist.
“The NFF is not responsible for making the selection of who joins the team. That is the decision of the coach. I know the story of Sone but unfortunately we are just focused on getting the team ready for Russia 2018,” says Pinnick.
Colin Udoh, a leading journalist and sports presenter, shares his insights on the team selection methodology used by the coach.
“It is the coach that selects not the federation even though they have some sway in the decision but ultimately it is the call of the coach. But yes, Sunday Oliseh, who was the previous coach, said he likes to pick players from the top division and I think most coaches in Nigeria want players who are playing at the highest level and the very best in the world rather than those playing in the lower division,” he says.
Secondly, Udoh claims that most European coaches like Rohr will not admit this is what they do. An additional criteria, which Rohr has also added to this team’s selection process evident in the team representing the Super Eagles, is the attempt to lower the average age of the players to 23 years except for John Mikel Obi, Leon Balogun and the goalkeeper where he is trying to integrate a bit of experience into team. So on these two key criteria, most players like Aluko unfortunately will fall out of contention.
“He is not in the top division and he also happens to be 28 years. I would pick him in a heartbeat but unfortunately I am not the coach. If you look at the way the team have qualified for the World Cup, you cannot argue with the results. Apart from that one loss against South Africa, Rohr has masterminded the success of the team to qualify for the World Cup and it is going to be hard to argue with that result,” adds Udoh.
It has been a long road to get here. Nigeria could qualify through the group stages by having the best balance of exciting promise and solidity. In every nook and cranny, and from every social stratum and walk of life, one thing is undeniable, and that is the game of football permeates every aspect of Nigerian culture, and Russia 2018 is another opportunity for the country to put away the differences and unite for this all-important goal.
After all, football in Nigeria is life.
<div id="attachment_36279" style="width: 1034px" class="wp-caption aligncenter"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-36279" class="wp-image-36279 size-large" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/GettyImages-161373524-1024x682.jpg" alt="" width="1024" height="682" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/GettyImages-161373524-1024x682.jpg 1024w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/GettyImages-161373524-300x200.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/GettyImages-161373524-600x399.jpg 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/GettyImages-161373524-768x511.jpg 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/GettyImages-161373524.jpg 2048w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px" />Nigeria&#8217;s supporters celebrate after their team scored the opening goal against Burkina Faso during the 2013 African Cup of Nations. Photo Getty Images.</div>

FBL-WC-2018-QUALIFIER-NGR-CMR

Nigeria; Where Football Is Life

African icon Didier Drogba is switching focus from time on the football pitch to the boardroom as he plots the next phase of his life that has already started with his move to United States second-tier side Phoenix Rising.
The Arizona desert is a far cry from Europe’s elite stadiums and UEFA Champions League finals, but for Drogba, who turns 40 in March, it is an important step in his life.
He admits his playing career is winding down, though in the latter part of the club’s 2017 United Soccer League season he still looked sprightly enough, netting 10 goals in 13 starts for the side.
He perhaps has one more year in him, but for the Ivory Coast star, one of the greatest players ever to come out of Africa, he says he is having more fun learning about the business of football.
He is now a co-owner of Phoenix Rising, brought on board to help the club with their aim of winning one of the four Major League Soccer expansion spots to be handed out in the coming years.
They have missed out on the first two, which were announced in December, but have high hopes for the next award which will be made known sometime in 2018.
“When I had this offer, I was thinking, ‘well, I have been a player before, but never an owner’, so it’s a good challenge,” Drogba tells FORBES AFRICA in Phoenix.
“It’s interesting for the future as well and what I would possibly want to do when I stop playing. I am going to be 40 in March, so it’s about time to think about what’s next. To apply what I was thinking a few years ago.
“The plan is going well; this opportunity is amazing because it puts me straight into what I want to learn. I enjoy more the fact that I am learning a lot about the other side of the game which is very important.”
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Phoenix Rising is a little over a year old, having been formed by a consortium led by local businessman Berke Bakay when he purchased the status of Arizona United.
Drogba took little persuading to come on board as the opportunity to be a “founding father” at a new club excites him.
“It’s an amazing project here, to build a team from scratch and apply for an MLS license. To [potentially] be part of the biggest league in America, it’s a good challenge.
“I played before in this league [MLS] with Montreal [Impact] and I had time to understand the league and the challenges, and to see how this opportunity could become a big one. That’s why I came here, to try to make history.”
Phoenix Rising had a few African players on their books in 2017, including South African Miguel Timm and Gladson Awako from Ghana.
Drogba hopes that his presence, and that of coach Patrice Carteron, who led Mali to third at the 2013 African Nations Cup and won the African Champions League with TP Mazembe, will provide a platform for more players from the continent.
“The league already has a lot of African players, but I hope my presence here will be an opportunity to bring more players and give them an opportunity to get better contracts, to get respected and to have a chance in their life. It’s what it’s about,” Drogba says.
“People say, ‘football players are making money’, but it is actually a way to deliver from this [hardship], it’s their life. It’s a different job but they still have to work to earn their money.”
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Drogba is set to keep playing in 2018, which will surely be his last as a player, though he says he still feels that same competitive spirit as when he first took to the pitch as a teenager.
“I’m having fun and that’s really what keeps me playing because my teammates are great and I feel like a kid when I see the ball. I’m still a competitor,” he says. “I don’t think that is something I will lose one day.”
The Ivorian adds that while he does enjoy being on the pitch, he is energized by what he is learning off it.
“The physique is OK, so I carry on playing, but the fact is I enjoy more that I am learning about the other aspects, the other side [business] of the game, which is very important.”
<div id="attachment_35325" style="width: 260px" class="wp-caption alignleft"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-35325" class=" wp-image-35325" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/02/Didier-Drogba-168x300.jpg" alt="Didier Drogba" width="250" height="446" />Didier Drogba while at Chelsea (Photo by Getty Images)</div>
It is then, perhaps, a time for reflection and for a player that won so many trophies in a glittering playing career, most notably with English Premier League side Chelsea, it is hard to pick three moments that mean the most to him.
“My first goals as a professional player, I scored twice [against Cannes in August 1999],” he says after some contemplation.
“Then the year I spent in Marseille. I had the chance, as a Marseille fan, to play in that stadium and it was a dream come true. It is something very special to me.
“Finally, Chelsea – not only the Champions League [win], but Chelsea the club, the people, the games we lost, the games we won, those years are very special as well.”
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And he says he could not have dreamed of the success he would have as a player, especially as something of a late bloomer who only really rose to global prominence when he joined Chelsea at the age of 26, but would later win two African Footballer of the Year titles, among many other accolades.
“I am beyond satisfied, of course I was dreaming of becoming a footballer, playing in big stadiums, 60,000 people and all that, but I never thought that I would go so far,” he says.
“Even if I had the dream, even if I had the desire to succeed, for me football has always been my passion and not my job. Maybe that is why I am still enjoying it now.”

The African Star Out To Dominate The States

Under the unforgiving glare of the Western Cape sky, dazzling even on an overcast September day like a cold grey spotlight, a frenetic game of kick volleyball is poised at 9-8. On a humble practice pitch near the imperious Cape Town Stadium, the players cajole their effervescent talisman as he skews his ambitious scissor kick just outside the line. This is Benni McCarthy, one of the finest footballing talents the continent has ever produced, and the new manager of Cape Town City FC.
We’re minutes from a Monday afternoon City FC press conference, and McCarthy is wrapping up training with a light-hearted warm-down. He has just led his team to the MTN8 cup final by beating Wits, the reigning league champions (Cape Town City FC lost in the final to Supersport United, a team coached by McCarthy&#8217;s former teammate Eric Tinkler). Wits are managed by Gavin Hunt, McCarthy’s coach two decades earlier at Seven Stars, where the 17-year-old striker began his playing career. McCarthy is unbeaten after a fifth win in succession since the start of the season. Spirits are high. Squad players relax with a PlayStation game as a posse of journalists assemble in an ante-room next to the main arena. It’s an unusually big attendance for a press conference for a South African Premier Soccer League (PSL) side – but this is an unusual club.
It is not, however, a new club per se. City FC is more a bold reimagining of an idea that until now has never had the chance to coalesce. Under apartheid, Cape Town football was fractured; white sides such as Hellenic and the original Cape Town City gave way in influence to Seven Stars and Cape Town Spurs, with the former committed to recruitment from the black townships and the latter to giving the city’s talented colored players a platform of their own. These merged to form Ajax Cape Town, daughter team to the legendary Amsterdam club. Down the years, support was spread thinly over myriad reboots; Ajax flew the flag, but the foot soldiers were restless.
In 2016, sensing an opportunity, businessman and former footballer John Comitis, one of the founding members of Ajax Cape Town, purchased the 80-year-old Mpumalanga Black Aces franchise, relocating it a thousand miles south west to the Western Cape. Comitis had sold his stake in Ajax after irreconcilable differences with the other major local shareholder, but understood that a new top-flight club could be free of the baggage of its closest rival. Ajax had struggled to lure away loyal black fans from their preferred township clubs of Kaizer Chiefs, Orlando Pirates and Mamelodi Sundowns, and some felt alienated by an adherence to a Dutch playing methodology that was ill-suited to the local footballing culture.
Cape Town City FC was born – and thrived in its first season under coach Eric Tinkler, winning the Telkom Cup and finishing an admirable third in the PSL. When Tinkler was controversially poached by Supersport United in June, Comitis looked to a man who had no interest in managing any club for at least another year.
“When the phone call came, I said no,” says McCarthy. “I’m doing my pro license in Ireland, and then now this, how am I going to juggle the two?” He’s relaxed and funny one-on-one, after a probing press conference that has flattered his current record while looking to tease out tactical revelations about a gigantic home game in two days against Kaizer Chiefs. “So I said ‘nah, I’m not ready, and I want to complete my course’, and I stuck to my guns… but John Comitis is a very persistent man. He knew just what to say, and he had everything covered.”
“I met Benni when he was 16,” says Comitis. “I took him on loan to Cape Town Spurs, which I owned at the time, and I assisted him in going to Ajax Amsterdam. I’ve given him his first PSL coaching job now. And at 39 there is nothing I could explain to Benni about the game that he would not already know from first-hand experience. My son Michel, who is our Commercial Director, kept insisting he was the right fit for the club’s ethos and growth.”
<div id="attachment_34839" style="width: 510px" class="wp-caption aligncenter"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-34839" class=" wp-image-34839" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/Benni-McCarthy-8-by-Jigga-Thomas-e1513328101585-300x200.jpg" alt="Benni McCarthy Cape Town FC" width="500" height="333" />Benni McCarthy on the sidelines during a match (Photo by Jigga Thomas)</div>
This ethos is front and center on the club’s website, with its exhortation of a liberal vision: “We’re for every religion and lifestyle choice. We’re for everyone with a voice. We’re for every color, race and creed.” The DreamClub 100 outreach program is also a priority, particularly in the deprived areas that may secretly harbour the next nascent superstar.
It was in one of these districts, the notorious Hanover Park gang stronghold in the Cape Flats, that a raw teenage McCarthy first learned his trade in the early 90s. A quick and skilful goalscoring winger, he played in day-long Sunday tournaments organized and financed by local gangsters.
“I made more money playing in that league than I was earning playing for Seven Stars,” he laughs.  “If you reach the final you’ve played five matches in the space of a day. But that was the adrenalin. You didn’t even feel it.”
This rite of passage, playing against intimidating grown men, was instrumental in his development.
“They kick the living daylights out of you, so you toughen up,” he remembers. “I was way ahead, physically, of the rest of the kids. So now you go from there, to your own age group, it’s a piece of cake man! With a little kick I’d be like, ‘How old are you? When you kick me, kick me properly!’ But yes, it was tough growing up in those neighborhoods because most kids… you’ll be lucky if you live past 20.”
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McCarthy’s rise from feisty street talent to top-flight elite was swift. Seven Stars’ merger with Ajax Cape Town opened the door to Ajax Amsterdam, where he tasted title success in his first season. After struggling to hold down a place at La Liga’s Celta Vigo, he converted productive loan spells at Porto into a permanent transfer, and a pivotal mentorship under a zealous young coach called Jose Mourinho.
He turns on the disarming McCarthy charm, giggling behind his jacket like a pantomime villain, as he admits to borrowing a little from the master’s philosophy.
“Mourinho was very meticulous, and his players know exactly what to do,” he says. “I love that about him. You’re set up to annihilate your opponents. You frustrate them, and then when they’re most vulnerable, you go for the jugular.”
McCarthy demonstrated a comparable ruthlessness by dispatching his boyhood idols Manchester United with a brace in the 2004 Champions League last 16 match. Porto would go on to win the competition, with McCarthy a second-half substitute in the final. He would later play for Blackburn Rovers under another of his heroes, Mark Hughes, before finishing his playing career back in South Africa; despite a fractious and combative relationship with the national team set-up, he remains Bafana Bafana’s record goalscorer. And his disruptive charisma is demanding attention all over again.
It’s Wednesday evening, and match-day traffic heading to the Chiefs game has slowed to a treacle of irritated klaxons and bass-confident car radios. Cape Town Stadium, a beautiful alabaster scallop on the northern Green Point tip of the Cape, is one of five new stadia built for the 2010 World Cup. Shared with Ajax, it can hold 55,000; tonight it will be half-full, a remarkable turnout for a weekday league game. Most of these fans, however, will be supporting Kaizer Chiefs. It’s an unsatisfactory state of affairs for a club with an appetite for long-term success.
“We can no longer operate like gypsies in our own backyard,” says Comitis. “The fundamental foundation of a football club is its home.”
<div id="attachment_34840" style="width: 511px" class="wp-caption aligncenter"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-34840" class=" wp-image-34840" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/Cape-Town-City-fans-at-Cape-Town-Stadium-by-Jigga-Thomas-e1513328374985-300x199.jpg" alt="" width="501" height="332" />Fans at Cape Town Stadium (Photo by Jigga Thomas)</div>
He insists that a variety of 10,000-seater options are being actively explored.
In a breathless match of mistakes and counter-punches, it’s Chiefs who gratefully snatch their first win of the season. There’s a strange atmosphere in the chilly stadium, as an animated McCarthy prowls the touchline; Chiefs fans, resplendent in feather headdresses, provide most of the energy in the stands with their songs and synchronized hip-swivelling. In contrast, it’s clear that City FC’s embryonic identity is still developing – their nickname ‘The Citizens’ is yet to find expression in costumes or plush toy merchandise.
“Rome was not built in a day,” says Comitis.
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It’s hard not to feel affection for the inclusivity Comitis is trying to engender. Every interaction with the club, from the owner, to the manager, to the communications team, is gracious and accommodating.
“That ethos runs through every aspect of the club’s growth ,” he says. “In the dressing room, among the staff, with our fans, with the corporate world in Cape Town, and the city itself – a project this size cannot exclude any of these stakeholders if it wants to succeed.”
It’s a club that’s reaching far, with a warm Cape wind of goodwill at its back. “When you stand on the side there, and you see that it’s happening… Just the joy that comes within me,” McCarthy says. “Because to see that…wow.”
He leans back and looks skyward. “It’s actually working.” &#8211; Written by Alastair Hagger

Ruthless? You Can Bet On Benni

The image of Neil Tovey standing alongside an elated President Nelson Mandela, and holding aloft the African Cup of Nations trophy in 1996, did not perhaps reverberate around the world like the one captured with Rugby World Cup-winning captain Francois Pienaar months earlier, but it remains an iconic moment in South African football and, sadly, a unique one.
South Africa had just won the 1996 Nations Cup on home soil and Mandela was tasked with handing the trophy to the winning captain, Tovey.
The joy on Mandela’s face was unbridled, for he too understood the significance of the moment that brought continental glory to a national side with all the colors of the Rainbow Nation.
Twenty one years later, and it remains the only time a Bafana Bafana skipper has had that honor. It is with some sense of irony that the man tasked with changing this is Tovey himself.
Now the technical director of the South African Football Association (SAFA), Tovey is responsible for developing the infrastructure and environment to bring through the next generation of national stars to win glory as he did.
Tovey and Springbok captain Pienaar had a lot of similarities from their magical moment caught in time.
Both were very good players, though perhaps not the best the country had to offer in their positions at the time. But what they brought was skilled leadership and an insatiable hunger for the fight.
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Tovey needed that fighting spirit after suffering two separate cardiac arrest incidents. The second, in October 2016, left him clinically dead for over two minutes before he was revived.
He was taking part in a charity cycle race and had already completed 42 kilometers when he collapsed.
&#8220;I was fighting for my life on the side of the road until cops found me and called an ambulance. It took the ambulance 20 minutes to get through the cycling route to where I am,” he says. “I’m fine now. But when you wake up in the morning and can say hello to someone, it makes you thankful.”
Tovey spent a week in hospital before being discharged, some 18 months after his first heart attack on a squash court in February 2015.
Most 55-year-olds who have suffered two such near-death experiences would have considered the quiet life, but Tovey feels he has more to give back to South African football. Being part of these “exciting times” gives him the motivation to keep working.
“We really are going through a great period for South African football at the moment,” Tovey tells FORBES AFRICA. “If you look at the national teams alone, the men’s under-17s qualified for the FIFA World Cup in 2015, the under-20s went to the World Cup in South Korea this year, and the men’s under-23 and women’s senior team went to the Olympics last year.”
“I think outside of hosts Brazil, we were one of the very few sides to have both our men’s and women’s teams at the Olympics.”
“So these successes must tell you something about the quality that we have and that the programs we have put in place to develop players are working. The senior national team has been going pretty well in the qualifiers for the [2019] Nations Cup and [2018] World Cup as well.
“There is a lot to be positive about and that makes you enjoy the work a bit more I think.”
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Tovey is also involved in the planning of what has been described as a game-changer for South African football – their proposed center of excellence at Fun Valley in Johannesburg.
“All of our licensing properties [coaching courses] that we host at national level will be at Fun Valley, as well as our congress and seminars. Instead of having to go and book out hotels, we will now have another solution which will save us loads of money,” Tovey says.
“It is such a big plus from a playing and coaching point of view to have everything on your doorstep. It’s massive. You are never far away from anything you need, be it training pitches, the gym, facilities to brief players, accommodation and medical help.”
“From a coaching point of view, it means you can be flexible and don’t have the disruptions of getting on a bus and having to fight through traffic just to get to where you need to be for a training session.”
“The facility will be used by all national teams, from under-17 up to the senior teams, men and women, and also then standardizes the way we prepare for matches and tournaments.”
“We will also have indoor and outdoor facilities that allows for more flexibility depending on weather and so on.”
Tovey knows as well as anybody about the hardships of qualifying for major finals on the African continent, something that has been elusive for South Africa in recent years.
<div id="attachment_33820" style="width: 510px" class="wp-caption aligncenter"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-33820" class=" wp-image-33820" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/Neil-Tovey-Bafana-Afcon-1996-e1507707849236-300x233.jpg" alt="" width="500" height="388" />South Africa&#8217;s captain Neil Tovey lifts the African Cup of Nations trophy after his side beat Tunisia in the final in 1996. (Photo by Mark Thompson/via Getty Images)</div>
“Bafana now have definitely got the talent, no doubt about it. But what was special in our [1996] team was the character. We had guys in our team who could change the game at the drop of a hat and to win major competitions, you need those special players, the likes of Doctor Khumalo, ‘Shoes’ Moshoeu and Mark Williams.”
“It was a special group of players – but this Bafana Bafana team that we have now is as talented. I just think mentally we were really on top of the game. We could get out of moments in the match, when we were up against it, much quicker than I think teams have of late.”
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Tovey, along with the 1996 Nations Cup winning team, has been inducted into the South African Sports Hall of Fame. He says it is a honor to be nominated, but is equally determined to make sure another group of Bafana Bafana players join his side there in the not-too-distant future.
“It is a privilege, because only a few South African sports people get accepted into the Hall of Fame and it will be something for my children’s children to look at with some pride.”
“It’s nice that it is happening now as well and not in 60 years when none of us will be around anymore. But we can’t let this be the last South African soccer team to be inducted into the Hall of Fame. I am determined to play my part in making sure that is not the case.” &#8211; Written by Nick Said

The Winner Who Defied Death Fights For The Holy Grail

Right, a comparison: Three players now at Manchester City would have a statue unveiled in their honour in about 2055, books celebrating them would be published and, for good measure, a TV program made.
The civic, national and even global acclaim would be centered on the threesome’s contribution to the season just passed – one in which Pep Guardiola’s side trailed in third in the Premier League.
With every respect to Sergio Aguero, Kevin De Bruyne and others, it isn’t going to happen. But it is happening to the dynamic, unusual components of the West Bromwich Albion team who gave Liverpool a good run for their money in the title race of 1978/79.
West Brom are seven years into their latest stay in English football’s top division and have never again touched the heights achieved by one of the best sides in the club’s 138-year history, featuring Laurie Cunningham, Cyrille Regis, Brendon Batson.
It isn’t through trophies won that those stars in stripes are remembered so fondly in the industrial heartland a few miles north-west of Birmingham. There were no additions of silverware; just a refreshing overhaul of football’s set ways in the country that gave the game to the world.
Black players, and indeed those from all parts of the planet, are now common in squads. The story in the 1970s was very different, though, and deeply disturbing.
Purely because of their skin color, individuals were routinely booed, abused and ducked fruit thrown from the terraces.
“The noise and level of abuse was incredible,” says Batson in Paul Rees’ 2015 book, The Three Degrees. “You’d get off the coach at away matches and the National Front would be right there in your face. We’d have to run the gauntlet and there would be spit on my jacket or Cyrille’s shirt. It was a sign of the times.”
Flying in the face of this odious prejudice came one of the Football League’s founder clubs and their colorful manager Ron Atkinson. It was he who nicknamed them the Three Degrees after the female singers from Philadelphia.
Albion were unlikely trailblazers in fielding three black players as Cunningham had grown up on the streets of north London and Regis and Batson also spent many formative years in the capital despite being born in the Caribbean.
But the three became a defining part of a thrilling, attack-minded team after being signed by different managers (Johnny Giles, Ronnie Allen and Atkinson) in the space of a year.
Lifelong Albion fan Dean Walton has seen his beloved club play at around 150 different grounds and in 19 countries and says: “We had not seen black players in Albion shirts before and there was racial tension at The Hawthorns at that time. These three certainly broke down many barriers and the number of black players who cite Cyrille as their major influence is testament to the presence of the man.”
Cunningham’s grace, trickery and perfect balance were uncorked late in 1976/77 when he arrived from Leyton Orient for £110,000 ($140,000). Regis, all muscular power and barnstorming runs, was cut loose early the following season. Forwards both, they hit the ground running with goals; plenty of them. Former Arsenal man Batson initially struggled when recruited from Cambridge United, where he had worked with Atkinson, but became an accomplished, unflappable, right back of considerable style.
They made varying contributions to a 1977/78 campaign in which Albion lost an FA Cup semi-final and qualified for Europe by finishing sixth. Then they and others gelled quite beautifully the following season, starting with three successive victories. A 7-1 slaughter of Coventry headlined a run of five wins in seven League matches in autumn and December was positively dizzying, with maximum points from four fixtures, including a 2-1 triumph at Arsenal on Boxing Day and, four days later, a spectacular 5-3 ‘signature game’ success at Manchester United that is still frequently shown on British TV.
Atkinson’s team outclassed Bristol City on New Year’s Day and went top of the table in mid-January. In an era of Liverpool dominance, many saw the Midlands upstarts as title favorites, so exhilarating were their performances over a year and a half.
“I’ve seen us referred to as one of the best teams ever to remain empty-handed,” Regis says. “People still tell us we could have won the League. It was the perfect storm – pure chemistry between excellent senior players and exciting younger ones.”
Hand-in-hand with their bid for a first championship in nearly 60 years, Albion were lighting up the UEFA Cup, discarding the notion that away first legs should be cagey assignments by comprehensively defeating Galatasaray in Turkey and Sporting Braga in Portugal.
Away to favorites Valencia in the next round, Cunningham was magnificent and his goal did more than earn the draw on which Albion fully capitalized back at The Hawthorns. It also alerted scouts from Real Madrid.
It was said Cunningham, his socks down round his ankles, could glide with such poise he barely left footprints in snow. Alas, there was ample opportunity to test that theory as his club was dealt an unkind hand by the weather.
That winter was particularly harsh and Albion twice endured three-week spells without League games. Their rhythm deserted them and two matches were subsequently lost. Liverpool kept playing and kept winning. A fixture backlog that was already punishing thanks to Cup replays and the journey to Europe’s last eight now had other additions.
Albion came strong again with runs of six and four consecutive League wins, but the electrifying spark had gone. The batteries were close to flat. It became perspiration rather than inspiration.
“We cut Liverpool’s lead back but they were used to that sort of congested programme through all their success,” adds Regis. “This was new for us. We had a small squad and, unlike Anfield, The Hawthorns didn’t have undersoil heating. A lot of grounds didn’t then.”
“We all wonder what would have happened if that had been a normal winter without so many disruptions.”
Recognition nevertheless came, only some of it welcome. After Albion even missed out to Nottingham Forest on the consolation prize of runners-up spot, Cunningham made his full England debut. Although a withdrawn individual, he left a big hole when a £950,000 fee made him the first Briton to join Real Madrid. He died in a car crash in Spain, in 1989, aged 33.
His good friend Regis was also well into the teens in goals scored that season. Many of his were spectacular, the result of devastating pace and power. He, too, became an England international – not bad considering the club paid only £5,000 to non-League Hayes for him. He was honored as the 1979 PFA Young Player of the Year.
Political correctness was in short supply then and Albion took on an all-black side, assembled by Regis, for a testimonial game for their midfielder, Len Cantello, in May. A teenage Garth Crooks, who was to win the FA Cup with Tottenham Hotspur and become a trustee of the Kick It Out anti-racism campaign, was in the side.
A program about the radical fixture was made and shown on free-to-view British TV this year.
“The idea was Ron Atkinson’s,” says Batson. “There had been a series of testimonials at the club and this was seen as something different that would appeal to the fans. We all thought it was a great idea and a bit of fun. It reflected the growing number of black players in the game.”
Batson, thrilled that his side won, went on to play 220 matches for the club and enjoy a fine post-playing career in the game. Like Regis, who collected an FA Cup winners’ medal with Coventry City in 1987, he has been awarded an MBE.
Furthermore, the Three Degrees are to be immortalized with a statue on a street near the Hawthorns. West Bromwich Albion supporters, and those with the game’s greater good close to their hearts, continue to hold them close. &#8211; Written by David Instone

How The Three Degrees Ran Racism Ragged

South African youngster Luther Singh is blazing a trail in Europe with Portuguese side Sporting Braga and has become the latest new hope for Bafana Bafana.
The versatile 20-year-old won Player of the Tournament and the top-goalscorer prize at both the regional 2016 COSAFA Under-20 Championships and continental African Youth Championships, leading to a first cap for the senior national team in March.
He followed that up with some strong showings at the FIFA Under-20 World Cup in South Korea in May, and even though he did not get on the scoresheet, there was much to admire in his play, which is all about pace, skill and confidence.
The first thing that catches the eye with Singh though is his name, as Indian players have been rare at the top level in South Africa.
“My grandfather is of Indian descent, but I was born and raised in Noordgesig in Soweto,” Singh tells FORBES AFRICA.
“I come from a football family in that my father, uncles and cousins all played the game, but at a semi-pro or amateur level. I am the first to make it to the professional ranks.”
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Singh was earmarked for a career in the professional game at the age of 11 when he was scouted by Farouk Khan, one of the top development coaches in the country who runs the successful Stars of Africa academy in Brixton, Johannesburg.
He was playing for junior side Nazarene FC and immediately after the game, Khan approached his parents to see if they would allow him to join the academy, where players live and are schooled.
“We don’t usually take players that young in the academy, but in Luther we could see immediately that there was something else – he is the complete package,” says Khan.
<blockquote>“He is a wonderful player. Aside from his technical skills, he can use both feet, and is strong and quick. He is a player that has all the attributes the modern game demands.”</blockquote>
“What he just needs now is patience, because he is very eager to be a first team player and sometimes he can overdo the training and push himself too hard. I always tell him that with his ability, he will have a successful career, good things will come to him if he is patient.”
Singh reveals that Khan is not only his old academy coach, but also a mentor.
“He has played a huge role in my life, he is my mentor,” Singh said. “We have like a father-son relationship. He has instilled great values in me and assured me that if I work hard, good things will come my way.”
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While at the academy, Singh had role models such as current Bafana stars Tokelo Rantie, May Mahlangu and Sibusiso Khumalo, who at the time were also just feeling their way into the professional game.
“They were guys that I looked up to and gave me a belief in myself. If they could do it, I felt I could also. I saw the sacrifices they made and that taught me that I had to do the same.”
Another spin-off of being at the Stars of Africa academy was, through Khan’s connections, the chance to train in Brazil, where football borders on religion, at the age of 16.
“I trained at Vasco da Gama and Fluminense, two massive clubs there. It was a very good experience to see the environment, the skill of the players and how they use it, and how seriously they take being a professional and developing young players.”
Word of Singh’s ability soon got around and he had a number of suitors from South Africa’s Premier Soccer League, but Khan felt a player of his ability was ready for Europe.
It was a surprise then that he ended up in the Swedish second division with GAIS in August 2015, certainly a low-key introduction to life outside of South Africa. But that was always the plan.
“We wanted him to go somewhere where he would play professional football immediately, not for an academy side, on the bench or in the stands,” says Khan. “GAIS provided that opportunity to him and it worked wonders.”
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Singh scored on his league debut and it quickly became clear to the Swedes that the teenager had something special. One Swedish journalist wrote that the South African was “far too good” for the Swedish second tier, and so it proved after a first full season in 2016 when he scored 10 goals in 23 starts, despite being used, at times, as a winger.
“When I arrived I played on the right or left-wings. I am lucky in that I can use either foot,” says Singh of his time at GAIS. “I also played as a number 10, or a forward, and that move has been really good for me. But I also enjoy playing as a winger, taking players on and creating chances for teammates. I like that.”
There was a lot of interest in Singh from all over Europe by the end of 2016, including the B-side of Real Madrid in Spain.
But he chose a club where he would likely see first team football more or less from the start, and in a league where his attacking instincts were unlikely to be stifled.
Braga finished fifth in the Portuguese league at the end of 2016/17 season, and will be involved in the UEFA Europa League in the new campaign.
Singh has settled well so far, and expects to be part of the first team group in the coming season.
It has helped that he has compatriots Bongani Zungu, Thibang Phete (also a former Stars of Africa graduate) and Haashim Domingo just 20 minutes down the road at Vitoria Guimar ães.
“I didn’t know Luther before, but along with Phete, they come to my house all the time,” says Zungu.
“Luther is a nice guy, very talented. I went to watch him play for Sporting Braga B before he went to the national team [in March] and he scored. It was my first time seeing him and I was very impressed.”
<blockquote>“There are players that look quite small off the field, but on it they are a beast. He has that presence.”</blockquote>
This should be the biggest season of Singh’s career to date, and as ever he is ready to learn.
“My current club [Braga] has players from all over the world, so there are a lot of skillful players,” he says.
“My teammates are highly technical, just like myself, so I believe the club’s style of play suits me very much. Working outside your own country is never an easy thing, but one needs to always remember why you have left your country of origin.”
“I have survived because I know what my priorities are – I am playing for my family, my country and to make a name for myself.”
“Football is a job, and I am grateful that I have been able to see the world because of the beautiful game, while I am also able to provide for my family.”
If his rise continues, before long the world will be seeing him. &#8211; Written by Nick Said

Is This Africa’s Next Star?

One of the oldest members of Vakhegula-Vakhegula, a soccer club in South Africa’s Limpopo province, is 85-year-old Gavaza Mathebula. This football club is like no other. Also known as ‘soccer grannies’, the club consists of 13 teams, all of whose players are elderly women.
To celebrate women’s month in South Africa, the United Nations (UN) even organized a friendly soccer match between themselves – an all-female soccer team – and Vakhegula-Vakhegula (meaning ‘grannies’ in Tsonga) on August 12. The grannies lost, but overall, they had won hearts even before they started.
Speaking before the kick-off, Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka, Executive Director of UN Women, said sport is usually associated with younger people but projects like Vakhegula-Vakhegula ensure everyone is involved, no matter their age.
On the pitch was 68-year-old Annah Kgofolo, a grandmother of nine, who has been leading  one of the club’s 13 teams since its inception in September 2012. She says playing soccer has immensely helped her and her teammates.
“When we go to the clinic for check-ups now, we find that we are fine, and able to live healthy and do household chores,” she says. They sometimes even play against opponents as young as their grandchildren but are often undermined.
“We have won about three matches so far,” says Kgofolo.
At the end of the match with the UN, the grannies lost 1-0, but the UN signed off with high praise for them, saying they see the ageing population as contributors to the development, and whose capabilities can add value to the society and the country’s policies and programs.
Vakhegula-Vakhegula was started in Limpopo by social worker Rebecca ‘Beka’ Ntsanwisi in 2003, and since then, other villages around the country have encouraged their senior citizens to take up soccer to stay fit.
“Our hope is to play against African countries and to at least be ranked in the top numbers. So far we have played with Zimbabwe,” says Ntsanwisi.
Even a documentary, Alive and Kicking: Soccer Grannies of South Africa, has been made on the soccer grannies, and it has received international attention, scooping several awards. According to the film’s makers, over 40 informal teams have been created across the country.
Representatives from the UN say the growing number of women and grannies playing soccer in various communities testifies the advancement of gender equality in the country as part of the Sustainable Development Goals.
This is especially pertinent as women often stop playing sports to conform to tradition and stereotypes.
Before launching Vakhegula-Vakhegula, Ntsanwisi, a 48-year-old mother of two, had been diagnosed with colon cancer. Her community work and frequent trips to the hospitals made her realize there were “a lot of sick elderly women” who needed help.
She would ask them where they experienced pain. The grannies would point to sore areas on their bodies and that made her realize they needed exercise to combat chronic illness.
Ntsanwisi’s doctors would also goad her to exercise to keep fit and not just depend on pills. This led to her inviting the older women in her community to be part of a soccer club so they could exercise together.
Soccer was the perfect choice for Ntsanwisi because in other sports like netball, players are required to jump.
“Jumping wouldn’t really help them, but soccer is a kicking and running sport. They run which helps the whole body,” she says.
When they are not dribbling or shooting goals, the grannies are making a living selling fruit and vegetables on the streets, or are domestic workers and pensioners.
Their soccer routine involves training twice a week, from 4.30AM until 6AM, after which they head home to commence their chores or get ready for work.
In an area where teenage pregnancy, poverty and unemployment is rife, Ntsanwisi says it is the norm for grannies to look after their grandchildren, but the soccer grannies simply “refuse to babysit”, which then discourages teenage pregnancy.
Vakhegula-Vakhegula is a great example of promoting healthy living among elderly women but it goes beyond the soccer field.
The club is also involved in charity work in their communities aiding poverty-stricken families and granting bursaries to disadvantaged students.
Twice a year, several teams in the club compete in the Top Eight league, also formed by Ntsanwisi in the hope of upholding club morale. In 2014, five grannies from the club joined the festivities of the Soccer World Cup in Brazil.
“The soccer-playing grannies are professional and very busy. We are like Banyana Banyana,” says Ntsanwisi, who is also a radio presenter on a local radio station, Munghana Lonene FM.
Just before entering the pitch, the grannies encourage each other with their vibrant singing. In their native Tsonga, they chant ‘when we get along, we make miracles’. Grandmothers kicking around on a football pitch. To the onlookers, that’s miracle enough.

Granny-team-011

Grannies  Having A Ball

As a young girl, Karabo Mathang-Tshabuse would step beyond the confines of her Soweto home to kick around a soccer ball in the dusty streets of her neighborhood. She didn’t play really well, she admits, but in her mind, she heard the rousing cheers of her community, the cheers of a township brought together by sport.
Little did she know these cheers would one day come true – though not for playing the sport, but for getting others to play it.
Soweto, one of South Africa’s oldest and most historical townships, has produced political leaders and Nobel laureates, and some of the country’s most successful entrepreneurs and sportsmen. Among them, star soccer player Jomo Sono, who lived three houses away from Mathang-Tshabuse.
With sportsmen next door, and a father who was soccer-crazy himself, she didn’t have to look far for influences.
“I was a daddy’s girl and I wanted to score points with him, he would watch soccer and I would want to please him and would yell ‘offside, offside’ to show I understood the game,” she says.
When you meet her, Mathang-Tshabuse is petite but ambitious and feisty – she spent nearly a decade battling with club managers, bidding for the best contracts for her clients.
At the age of 21, Mathang-Tshabuse became the first woman in South Africa to be a SAFA (South African Soccer Federation) and FIFA-accredited soccer agent. Soccer was not by design, she says. It happened quite by chance.
<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="size-medium wp-image-31006 alignleft" src="http://www.forbesafrica.com/app/uploads/2017/05/IMG_5053-200x300.jpg" alt="" width="200" height="300" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/IMG_5053-200x300.jpg 200w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/IMG_5053-300x450.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/IMG_5053-600x900.jpg 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/IMG_5053-683x1024.jpg 683w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/IMG_5053.jpg 682w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 200px) 100vw, 200px" />
“It was never a dream of mine to be an agent; the truth is I fell into it.”
Mathang-Tshabuse was always precocious. She was only 13 when she started working, doing small jobs in radio and retail, whilst figuring out the real purpose of her life.
She went on to do a Bachelor’s degree in International Relations and Media Studies, subjects she chose on account of her proximity to politics – her father Ruby Mathang is the MMC of Economic Development for the City of Johannesburg.
Her weekends at university were spent watching soccer games with friends, who would later help her start P Management – P for Player, Professional or pomotso, meaning comfort, she says.
“We wanted to do coaching clinics, accumulate money and then represent players,” she says.
Their first cue was media reports of the lifestyles and spending habits of soccer players. She thought it would be a good idea to approach them and say “let us look after your affairs”.
“You have people from a background where there is no education in terms of finance and addressing the media, no education in terms of how to live in the public domain,” she says.
Along with a trio of like-minded friends – one of them now her husband – she launched the company in 2007. Thankfully, the business received a favorable response.
“From getting booked every weekend, it kind of grew and we could accumulate the capital.”
The next step was looking at what representing a soccer player meant, especially in terms of capital.
It took them two years to move into an office and have enough money to manage players full-time, handling their contracts and protecting their interests.
“It was exciting, the terrain was unset, the landscape undefined, it was an area where we could go in and set the tone and there weren’t that many competitors and yet there was a lot of demand for representation.”
The early days, when she was merely in her 20s, were exciting, as she hobnobbed with the chairmen of soccer clubs, and represented those close to her age.
“To have them have confidence in me was the confidence-booster,” she says of her earlier clients.
Her reception from the club heads in this male-dominated industry was a “mixed bag”. Some were intrigued by her presence – “what is this young girl doing?” – whereas others just did not want her there, not because she was a woman, she believes, but because agents are not generally welcome.
The only difference between a male and female soccer agent, she reckons, is the men are more business-minded. As a female soccer agent, she feels it her responsibility to continue to promote female soccer players as most agents don’t do so – there is not a lot of money in their game.
“I’m inclined to find talent so I do approach players that are female but it does not make me inclined to them. I am aware of the limitations of where you can take women because our professional game is not at the same level as the guys.”
Mathang-Tshabuse and her husband Josy Tshabuse have two daughters who are already showing an interest in soccer but she secretly hopes they become anything but a soccer agent, unless it’s a “calling”.
“That is why I believe I fell into football, I wouldn’t have chosen this for myself,” she says, as it’s a taxing job.
From scouting out a player to traveling with them from club to club and marketing them, there may be no returns on expenses incurred in promoting an amateur player, especially if they do not get signed.
“It’s like flushing money down the drain.”
Another concern is the uncertainty in the sector at the moment with the threat of agent fees dropping from 10% to 3%, making it harder to break-even with entry-level players.
It took Mathang-Tshabuse three attempts to get accredited as a soccer agent and as someone who never experienced failure, she would not accept it – but that was the only way up.
“The agent exam that I failed the first time was my first test as to how I was going to respond, I knew what it meant to pass, I knew I wasn’t doing it for myself, I was doing it for the hundreds of other girls that would pioneer in areas that are uncharted.”
She set her mind on passing the exam.
“Once I set my mind on something, I had to get it, I was like, ‘who are you? How dare I fail you’?”
The second time she took the exam, she failed again but by then, she knew she would keep trying until she passed.
Once licenced, another challenge lay ahead: she had to get access into the clubs.
“It was challenging in that you weren’t given the space, you had to create the space for yourself but I must say it was the time of my life, I was making an impact, living for a purpose.”
One story Mathang-Tshabuse relates often is of taking a third division player and getting him into a premier league. She had to negotiate hard for the player and decided to walk away.
The club called back because they realized he was good and offered more than triple the amount they had initially put on the table for him.
He didn’t disappoint, with about 18 appearances in his first season, he was then in demand by other pro teams.
“Taking someone from a third division, to premier, to being demanded is why I do the work I do,” she beams.
South African football club Orlando Pirates’ Mbongeni Gumede and Banyana Banyana’s Amanda Dlamini are a couple of players Mathang-Tshabuse represents.
The future for her company is sports law. Mathang-Tshabuse believes there are areas in football and sports law that are not really addressed; for instance, she says many sportsmen don’t know much about anti-doping regulations.
“This is the one thing that I’m actually more excited about, being able to represent players and not only market them. The legal side fascinates me so much.”
She is now studying for a law degree at the University of the Witwatersrand and eventually hopes to represent athletes in other sports, for example cricket.
Her game has only just begun.

IMG_5101

Dribbling Through The Barriers

He may be a bit slower these days, but the ball still sticks to his feet as if it were on a string. Forty years on, Paradise Moeketsi dribbles like the maestro who broke the law to teach him. His name was Sir Stanley Matthews – the black man with a white face who thought the game could overcome all.
On this same Soweto street, then a patch of field, Matthews changed Moeketsi’s life.
<div id="attachment_3390" style="width: 217px" class="wp-caption alignleft"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-3390" class="size-medium wp-image-3390" src="/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/2669097-207x300.jpg" alt="" width="207" height="300" />Stanley Matthews outside-right for England and Blackpool FC, in action during a match for Blackpool. (Photo by Frank Harrison/Getty Images)</div>
“I was highly influenced by this man. He used to play without any formation. A lot of people say Mandela is the greatest, I disagree; it was him. He was a gentleman; he was never given a yellow card or a red card! He’s phenomenal, out of this world,” says Moeketsi.
Moeketsi was one of Stan’s Men, the team Matthews fostered in Soweto. His teacher was the David Beckham of his time who broke the law on segregation in sport to coach in the township.
Now a football coach in his own right, Moeketsi practises everything that Matthews preached. In his 20 years, the Soweto coach has trained and mentored young players who made it to the South African national team, Bafana Bafana.
“I met [Matthews] when I was very young. I was around 11 and now I’m 51. It was the first time, personally, that I met a white man,” he says.
Matthews’ trained 60 young players under the eye of apartheid police in what was as much about courage as it was about sport.
“It was unsafe, a white man in Soweto; in those days it was difficult. I thought [that] white people were not good, that they were bad people, but I changed&#8230;”
For many of Stan’s Men he was the first white man they had ever seen, if not, he was certainly the first who had been kind to them.
Matthews’ first trip to Soweto was in 1955. Completing his pre-season training with his young wards, he returned to England just as his team, Blackpool, was ready to do battle with Arsenal at Highbury.
According to Matthews’ memoir, The Way It Was, his manager, Joe Smith, was anxiously waiting for him in the team’s hotel lobby.
“Where the bloody hell have you been?” he says.
“South Africa, I rang and told you but you never listen,” replies Matthews.
“When did you get back?”
“Last night.”
“Are you match fit?”
“Yes.”
That day, Matthews, who had kicked his last ball in Soweto, played what is considered one of his best games for Blackpool securing a 3-1 victory. His boots may have lived in England but his heart was in Africa.
<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="alignleft size-medium wp-image-3392" src="/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/IMG_2612-300x200.jpg" alt="" width="300" height="200" />
“I had some extraordinary experiences during my time in Africa. In Ghana in 1956, I was crowned King of Soccer&#8230; The initiation was a real crowning as befits a king and left me not a trifle embarrassed. A witch doctor danced around me then spat on a football [that] I had at my feet. I was then seated upon a throne, a crown placed on my head, and my clothes removed and replaced by traditional Ghanaian robes&#8230;”
Matthews travelled through the continent; from Ghana to Zimbabwe but most of his time was spent in Soweto coaching Stan’s Men. He moved to South Africa briefly with his wife, Mila, in the 1970s.
“It was 1975 and apartheid was, of course, still very much in force&#8230; I never had any luck with it and for years had happily stayed in Soweto on my visits there to coach. I simply ignored it and for the most part, I am relieved to say, those misguided people who inflicted it upon that beautiful country chose to ignore the fact that I flouted its rules,” he says in his book
According to Matthews, Stan’s Men were a promising bunch of dreamers who were funded by the Sunday Times newspaper in Johannesburg.
“The boys told me that their dream was to go to Brazil and play football there, though they knew this would never happen.”
Moeketsi and his fellow teammates had a point. It was the height of apartheid, an exit permit for a black football team would have been nigh impossible. Then there was the issue of money, none of their families could afford a passage to Brazil. They believed it was mere fantasy.
Matthews decided to make the trip happen, flouting apartheid to the extreme. He used his reputation and connections to secure money from a Coca-Cola executive and the Sunday Times. A Brazilian airline offered 16 free tickets to Rio de Janeiro.
<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="alignleft size-medium wp-image-3393" src="/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/Marie-photo-300x196.jpg" alt="" width="300" height="196" />
Then, Matthews and his men headed for the airport under the threat of arrest.
“I figured that if we turned up at the airport for our flight, the authorities would not prevent us from leaving the country because it would cause a major incident,” writes Matthews.
He was right. They let him go, with the first all-black football team to tour outside of South Africa. The authorities were content to send two secret agents to tail them.
Moeketsi, like many of the Soweto players, couldn’t make the trip.
“My grandfather was worried that I wouldn’t come back so I didn’t go. It was difficult; a once-in-a-lifetime trip and our parents said ‘No!’”
On the flight there, Gilbert Moiola, the 18-year-old team captain, turned to Matthews and shook his hand.
“Stanley, you are a black man with a white face,” he said to his coach, a title coined during the crowning in Accra.
The team arrived to a hero’s welcome and a grand reception. Along with meeting Pélé, they also trained with Brazilian coaches including Zico. Matthews even had tea with the Great Train Robber, Ronnie Biggs, at his Rio apartment, who told him that he was a fan of Charlton Athletic.
The legacy of that remarkable trip, even for Moeketsi who did not go, is strong in Soweto.
“It took so long to forget about him. Even today, he’s still alive in Soweto. His spirit is still with us,” he says.
Matthews died in 2000, just months after he made his last trip to Soweto, before Moeketsi had a chance to say goodbye.
“I asked him to take me to England, but unfortunately he passed away.”
In 2010, the year the football World Cup came to South Africa, Moeketsi finally made the trip to Stoke City, the club where Matthews made his name in the town where he was born. It had been almost four decades since he first saw Matthews gliding across the rough Soweto pitch.
“The important part of it is me being able to fulfil my dream, to lay the wreath on Sir Stan’s grave to say thank you so much… I’d [wanted] to come and thank him and say rest in peace,” he told journalists at the stadium where Matthews’ remains are buried.
Matthews’ daughter, Jean Gough, stood beside him and was clearly touched.
“It’s so wonderful that he’s come all this way just to do this. It’s really emotional for me,” she says as they both battle tears.
On the note attached to the wreath was the farewell that Moeketsi couldn’t deliver in person.
“Sir Matthews, thank you so much for what you did in our country&#8230; I will never forget you.”

The Black Man  With A White Face

<ol>
<li>
<h3>Is enough attention being given to women’s football?</h3>
</li>
</ol>
It is increasingly getting attention and a lot of great work by players and stakeholders of women’s soccer has contributed to this, but it is still nowhere near the popularity of men’s soccer. Hopefully, the FIFA Women’s World Cup Canada 2015 will get attention following this year’s FIFA World Cup Brazil, where there have been some interesting developments and unexpected results.
<ol start="2">
<li>
<h3>If you were to write an autobiography, what would you call it?</h3>
</li>
</ol>
I might call it My Life, My Time – This Is My One Shot. There’s a play on soccer words there. One of the passions born from the academic side of me has been to write, but I honestly believe we are here to live our lives with every moment and every opportunity presented to us to be great. There’s greatness in each and every one of us, and you just have to find your passion, because that’s the key that will unlock your greatness. You have one life that you’re living right now; you owe it to yourself and find that passion to unlock who you can be.
<ol start="3">
<li>
<h3>What is more interesting – team talks or business meetings?</h3>
</li>
</ol>
There is always a game plan and passion in both, and both can be equally interesting. However, team talks are more entertaining, especially with people who have been in your life for so long you consider them family.
<ol start="4">
<li>
<h3>Ever met a guy intimidated by your soccer skills?</h3>
</li>
</ol>
Maybe one [who was] intimidated by my fearless defending skills, because I couldn’t care whether you are male or female. I am there to do my job and to the best of my ability. However, maybe that should be answered by some of the guys’ teams that we’ve played against – including my husband’s team. I have seen girls give guys ‘eShibobos’ (where they push a ball through the opposition’s legs) and delivered great shots to the back of the net. There’s a lesson in life for both men and women – never underestimate your opponent.
<ol start="5">
<li>
<h3>Have you ever had a female coach?</h3>
</li>
</ol>
Not in soccer. Men are dominant in this area. There are a few rising stars in South Africa doing great work coaching our future generation of female footballers, such as Banyana Banyana captain and central defender Janine Van Wyk.
<ol start="6">
<li>
<h3>Would you wear pink soccer boots?</h3>
</li>
</ol>
I have never owned a pair, but a lot of players do wear them and I’m indifferent about the color of my boots. I am more about practicality over style – I need boots to get the job done in the comfort that I need. I tend to go with boots that match my kit though.
<ol start="7">
<li>
<h3>What are you more comfortable in – your corporate attire or soccer kit?</h3>
</li>
</ol>
My soccer kit. It comes with great accessories – my teammates and coach as well as the support of my husband and great friends and family.

FWA-2014-Aug-Sep-096-Nicole-de-Matos-001

7 Questions With…

Soccer-loving young girls in northern Kenya may never have heard of Elham Sayed Javad, but they have a lot to thank her for. If it was not for the Canadian-based fashion designer, they would not be able to play in official tournaments.
Javad created a hijab which operates magnetically. It opens and releases if it is pulled from anywhere around the neck area. Her design was one of the two approved by FIFA in June last year, when it lifted its ban on the religious garment, which had been in place for five years due to safety concerns.
<div id="attachment_5872" style="width: 268px" class="wp-caption alignleft"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-5872" class="size-medium wp-image-5872" src="/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/000_Nic502245-258x300.jpg" alt="" width="258" height="300" />Bahraini player Muna al-Edaysi (R) vies with Palestnian Nivin al-Kolayb during their Women&#8217;s Arabia Cup football match in Manama on October 27, 2010. AFP PHOTO/ADAM JAN</div>
The ruling means women and girls who wear the hijab for religious reasons can now play in competitive soccer competitions. Having overcome that hurdle, all that was left for the girls from the Horn of Africa (Hodi region) was to find a competition to participate in.
Last year’s East Africa Cup presented them with a rare opportunity. The event is organized for youths between the ages of 11 and 16. It combines a range of sporting and cultural events and is lauded for highlighting gender issues. Apart from that, the team have little else.
There is no girls’ or women’s league to play in, and any ambitions of representing the country, while admirable, may prove little more than a pipe dream.
The level the Kenyan girls would have looked at, the under-17 event, appears to be one of the most problematic in their country and many others on the continent.
Kenya withdrew from the under-17 World Cup qualifiers in August because of what they claim was a logistical issue with their opponents, Equatorial Guinea. Kenya claimed the Equatoguineans’ communication regarding match details such as the venue and the kick-off time, as well as confirmation of visas, was received too late.
What actually occurred is not clear. Equatorial Guinea’s media had reported that Kenya may not arrive, but on the match day, August 16, activities went ahead as planned. The officials were present, the Equato-
guinean team warmed up, and stood to attention for their national anthem.
They were even instructed to kick off, and did, scoring a goal before the match was awarded in their favor because of the Kenyan no-show.
Farce aside, Equatorial Guinea have now qualified for the final playoffs which will decide which three African sides travel to Costa Rica for next year’s under-17 women’s World Cup. They will play Ghana in a two-legged tie this month.
The other clashes will be between Zambia, who beat Botswana to advance to this stage, and South Africa, who received a bye into the deciding stage. Nigeria were also given a free passage to the last six and will face Morocco.
For Kenya, all that’s left is disappointment and questions. While some of their aspiring players received a boost in the form of the lifting of the ban on the hijab, others were left high and dry by the under-17 shenanigans.
Their coach, Florence Adhiambo, says incidents like this make it difficult for the girls to stay motivated.
“It’s heartbreaking to see things like this happen. It discourages girls who have just started with their careers,” she says.
She is not alone in these sentiments. Former Nigeria captain Flo-rence Omagbemi, who was on the organizing committee for the 2012 under-17 World Cup, and remains on it for next year’s event, echoed those thoughts at a meeting in Zurich.
“All is not well with the game at the moment in Africa and we need to act fast to salvage the situation,” she says. “We have a lot of talented young girls with great passion for the game but they have no support from their federations. The soccer administrators are not doing much to help improve women’s soccer.”
The most obvious example of that is in the lack of fixtures. The African Women’s Championship has been taking place biennially since 1998 (the men’s has been going since 1957) and age-group qualifications are also held every two years. But the number of countries pulling out means the competition is often marred by the cancellation of fixtures.
More tellingly, there are no fully professional leagues in the women’s game on the continent. That leaves it lagging behind places like the United States, where the women’s game is run the same way as the men’s.
As a consequence, Nadi Sora, the coach of the Hodi girls’ team, explains they don’t have much to aspire to.
“There are no female role models, so there is still discrimination against girls. The whole community enjoys sport, but the girls do not have leagues, we just have tournaments, so we have to wait for a tournament to compete,” she says.
One woman to look up to is the president of Burundi’s football association, Lydia Nsekera, the first woman on FIFA’s executive committee, and who was profiled on these pages last month. Nsekera agrees that without regular competitive matches, women’s soccer will continue to lag behind. She has also identified financial reasons as one of the main roadblocks to developing the women’s game.
“In Africa, there are people who question the rationale for funding female football. But I am confident that, with the right encouragement, women’s football will evolve and reach the level of men,” Nsekera says decisively.
South Africa is one place where corporates have been captivated by the women’s game. In June, Sasol announced a four-year extension of its sponsorship for Banyana Banyana, the national women’s team, and the semi-professional soccer league for women. Many players in the league combine playing soccer while they are still studying.
At least in South Africa, there is some form of encouragement for girls to think seriously about the game. In other countries, especially those with more traditionalist ideas of the role of women, it is frowned upon for girls to take up the game.
FIFA’s unbanning of the hijab has helped for some, but Sora reveals that the Hodi girls’ team still face reprisal from their neighbors.
“The community looks down on us, they curse us and say things to us like, ‘you should not disrespect your culture’, but we continue to play, because when we play football, we are free.”
What the youngsters need are more people like Nassra Juma Mohammed, the founder of Zanzibar’s Women Fighters FC. Mohammed was inspired by the Swedish women’s soccer team, who visited the island in 1998, and wanted to start her own club.
The team are another of Africa’s success stories. They are sustainable because they draw funds from a small shop Mohammed started. And they are successful because their determination, more than their love of the game, allows them to challenge everyone from teachers to their husbands as they fight for their right to play soccer.
Some of the people standing in their way are hard-line religious men who claim women should not play soccer because “they shouldn’t wear shorts”. Even though these women continue to rebel against such restrictive ideals, if any one of them was to agree with the idea or felt she would have a better chance if she covered up, she need only don one of Javad’s hijabs to adhere to Islam, stay on the right side of the FIFA’s laws and still play the beautiful game.

Hijhab scores a goal against FIFA

George Weah, the Liberian soccer legend-turned- politician, barrels out onto the sports field dressed in an electric-blue jersey. Flanked by his entourage, tussling photographers and journalists, the towering 48 year old rolls forth with the Ballon d’Or, the trophy he claimed in 1995 while playing for AC Milan, hoisted on his broad shoulders. The crowd roars and his long-time political rival, Liberia’s formidable commander-in-chief President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, follows behind dressed in a black and white lapa suit.
Weah and Johnson Sirleaf deliver muffled messages about reconciliation and the president’s column-like security guard, wearing aviator sunglasses, raises the glinting solid-gold ball into the overcast sky. Weah, the only African to win the prize, did so during the heat of Liberia’s civil war that raged for 14 years and left 250,000 dead, the nation’s infrastructure in ruins and its people deeply traumatized. The soccer star hauled the prize back from his home in Florida in the United States, where he spends at least half of his time, as a symbol of peace.
Retired and current soccer celebrities from across the continent and government officials take to the field for a friendly match organized by Weah, who last December accepted his appointment by Johnson Sirleaf as peace ambassador. Weah is now the face of the government’s latest attempt to reconcile a nation that remains deeply divided a decade after the gunfire ceased and former president Charles Taylor went into exile. But among the spectators it is clear, reconciliation or not, their main purpose is to see Weah, or King George as he is known to Liberians.
<div id="attachment_31208" style="width: 310px" class="wp-caption alignleft"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-31208" class="size-medium wp-image-31208" src="http://www.forbesafrica.com/app/uploads/2017/05/20130622-wingard-0623-300x200.jpg" alt="" width="300" height="200" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/20130622-wingard-0623-300x200.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/20130622-wingard-0623-600x400.jpg 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/20130622-wingard-0623-768x512.jpg 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/20130622-wingard-0623.jpg 1024w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" />Monrovia, Liberia &#8211; June 22, 2013: Football game organized by George Weah at SKD. (Photograph by Morgana Wingard).</div>
After a failed attempt at the presidency in 2005 and the vice presidency in 2011, Weah is now tasked with helping drive forward the stalled process to reunite the nation. Many Liberians remain cynical about the reconciliation process after a controversial Truth and Reconciliation Commission, whose findings and recommendations were sidelined because of legal issues and the indictment of those among the political establishment. This is a major challenge that Weah has to confront.
A new 18-year reconciliation roadmap has been launched placing an emphasis on restorative, rather than retributive, justice.
The reconciliation process suffered a blow last year when peace activist Leymah Gbowee, who was also the head of a previous initiative, resigned after criticizing Johnson Sirleaf of nepotism and her failure to address present-day issues such as corruption. In a statement, Gbowee referred to “differences in opinion on the pathway for national healing and reconciliation” as her reason for stepping down.
When asked whether he is concerned about the reasons for Gbowee’s resignation, Weah says: “She took a long time to notice that.”
Weah’s critics say that he is not capable of the role and that he was appointed to appease young Liberians who are angry with Johnson Sirleaf’s government.
Critics such as Dan Saryee, a Liberian democracy and rights activist, says that Weah lacks a vision for national reconciliation. “Reconciliation is not just about having a sports jamboree. Sports do not address the reconciliation concerns of a farmer in Grand Kru, Gbarpolu or a fisherman in River Cess or Bassa.”
But Weah is confident that his previous work as a UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador during the civil conflict, his role in helping encourage former fighters and child soldiers to disarm and his rapport with ordinary Liberians was the reason he was chosen by the president and why he is the best man for the job.
“I was the right person, because of the love that people have for me, and the way I can persuade people. I accepted it because this is the country I love. I want to see the country peaceful and stable,” Weah tells FORBES AFRICA in an exclusive interview at his residence in Rehab, a suburb on the outskirts of Monrovia.
In the coming months, Weah will embark on a ‘Listening Tour’ across 16 counties to talk to Liberians about their grievances and also facilitate dialogue between tribes that have been in conflict in the past, before forwarding his findings to the government. A similar exercise was undertaken by Gbowee during her time as head of the reconciliation initiative.
Weah is seen by many of his supporters as a man of the masses, the less-than-a-dollar-a-day Liberians who eke out an existence in a society that still remains deeply polarized economically.
Born and raised by his grandmother in a slum in Bushrod Island, and discovered and nurtured by President Samuel Doe, who was brutally executed at the beginning of the war, Weah represents an impossible dream, but nevertheless a dream for Liberians, who until the end of the conflict in 2003, had little to hope for.
“His is the only face we see to redeem us,” says Samuel Kun, a 28-year-old sociology student at the University of Liberia.
“Weah is from the ghetto so he knows what we are going through and he can [empathize] with us.
If he’s our president I’m sure things can change, it might not be constant but I’m sure he will do his best.”
Weah’s home in Monrovia is nothing like the one in which he grew up. Concertina wire crowns the high maroon wall that surrounds his compound and is manned by guards wearing blue polo shirts and sports caps that read ‘security’.
I interview Weah in a lounge room overlooking a tiled pool, and fitted with the trappings of masculine affluence—a wooden bar, a pool table, a flat-screen TV, modern black couches backed by a window that looks out onto three luxury cars. Weah wears a crème shirt with jeans and a fitted charcoal suit jacket and holds his pair of reading glasses in his hand. I ask whether his loafers are Gucci.
“That’s hard work, not government money,” he responds sharply.
Regardless of Weah’s flamboyant lifestyle, he is seen as one of the few Liberians to have earned his riches the honest way—through hard work, success, talent and a bit of good luck—in a country where the political class and those in power are still largely viewed as a league of rogues. In 2012, Transparency International named Liberia and Mongolia as the most corrupt countries in the world in its Global Corruption Barometer.
Many of Weah’s supporters are deeply suspicious of the government and its commitment to reconciliation and are concerned this could be a trap for the political leader, who is tipped to be among the leading presidential candidates in 2017. Even within Weah’s party, the decision was met with many dissenting opinions.
Some opposition leaders and analysts have argued that Johnson Sirleaf is setting Weah up for failure to destroy his political future.
But Weah dismisses claims that he is being used as a political pawn and says that he will step down if he thinks the government lacks commitment to reconciliation and is attempting to silence him.
“We have to monitor their actions […] I’m not going to sit aside because I am the peace ambassador if the government does things that aren’t right. I think by now you should know I have character.”
<div id="attachment_31207" style="width: 310px" class="wp-caption alignleft"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-31207" class="size-medium wp-image-31207" src="http://www.forbesafrica.com/app/uploads/2017/05/20130622-wingard-0138-300x200.jpg" alt="" width="300" height="200" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/20130622-wingard-0138-300x200.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/20130622-wingard-0138-600x400.jpg 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/20130622-wingard-0138-768x512.jpg 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/20130622-wingard-0138.jpg 1024w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" />Monrovia, Liberia &#8211; June 22, 2013: Football game organized by George Weah at SKD. (Photograph by Morgana Wingard).</div>
He also says the debate over the Truth and Reconciliation Commission should be reopened.
Weah says he is aware of the challenges ahead and the level of resentment and dissatisfaction among Liberians, many of whom who do not have an affordable life. These are challenges that are beyond the ethnic divisions and human rights abuses that characterized the brutal civil war. Less than two 2% of Liberians have access to pipe borne water, a mere 0.58% of people have access to public electricity, and 76% of the population live on less than a dollar a day.
“Peace for me is equitable distribution of the national wealth; peace for me means true justice,” says Weah.
Weah is optimistic about the future of the reconciliation process but some argue his entry into the 2014 senatorial race could get in the way.
“If he does run as a senator it means that his role within the reconciliation roadmap may be diminished. Weah could use this platform to mobilize more votes,” says Edward Mulbah, the senior technical advisor at the Liberia Peacebuilding Office, the body charged with organizing reconciliation activities.
But for now, Weah says there is no conflict between his political ambitions and role as peace ambassador.
The 2011 elections that Weah participated in underlined the urgent need for reconciliation. The Congress for Democratic Change (CDC) boycotted the run-off claiming they had won the first round, a claim that was reinforced by a letter by the National Elections Commission declaring them winners. That body later claimed the letter was a mistake. The day before the elections, they staged a demonstration during which police fired live rounds and killed at least one demonstrator and injured others. Johnson Sirleaf won by 90.6 % of the vote due to a low voter turnout, that the International Crisis Group (ICG) argues was due to fears of escalating violence. The Carter Center election monitoring team deemed the elections free and fair with some irregularities. This was the second time Weah had cried foul during an election.
“I still maintain that there was no transparency, there was no true democracy,” claims Weah.
Analysts predict that Weah will have a landslide victory in the Montserrado senatorial race, the most populous county in Liberia and one that is his party’s political stronghold.
If he succeeds in next year’s race, Weah will become senator of a county that is home to over 1.5 million people, 70% of who are estimated to live in slums like the one he grew up in. Weah’s childhood community of Geblah Town underlines the challenges that lie ahead. I travel to the cramped community, along rain-slicked, potholed roads, passing people drawing filthy water from square concrete wells and drainage overflowing with waste. There I meet Philip Sayon Jr, a 20-year-old CDC supporter and university student. Sayon is optimistic that things will change if Weah becomes president.
“He loves his Liberian people; he knows the soil from which he came from; he passed a lot of difficulties. He will give the people a chance,” he says.
While Weah is yet to make his real debut in the political arena, the expectations of his performance are huge.   FL

20130625-wingard-0124

Chasing A THROUGH BALL TO POWER

The gap between rich and poor is growing in the Premier Soccer League (PSL), Africa’s most expensive league. In the modern game of 2013, it’s the corporate box that rules soccer. Any club that hopes to stand a chance of competing needs cash, as much as a fleet-footed striker.
<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="alignnone size-medium wp-image-31161" src="http://www.forbesafrica.com/app/uploads/2017/05/IMG_7875-200x300.jpg" alt="" width="200" height="300" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/IMG_7875-200x300.jpg 200w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/IMG_7875-300x450.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/IMG_7875-600x900.jpg 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/IMG_7875.jpg 683w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 200px) 100vw, 200px" />
In South Africa’s PSL, top dogs Kaizer Chiefs has a squad worth R138 million ($13.8 million). In contrast, newcomers Mpumalanga Black Aces has less than half of that with R62 million ($6.2 million). Striker Mabhuti Khenyeza, Black Aces’ most expensive player, is valued at R5.4 million ($540,000). Chiefs’ most expensive player is South African international, Bernard Parker, worth R14 million ($1.4 million).
The way Black Aces started this season is a sign of desperate times. Until halfway through August, they didn’t have a home stadium. In their first match of the season, when they squared off against Kaizer Chiefs, Black Aces had to rent out the Mbombela Stadium in Nelspruit.
Chiefs, who are awash with cash from sponsors and the sale of thousands of shirts, don’t need to think twice about filling a stadium.
The PSL is no place for sissies. The action may be in the corporate boxes, but this is unmistakably an African night. The smoke from the open fires in the township outside reflects light for miles; the waves of yellow and blue shirts undulate as shots flash past the goalpost; the faint echo of taxi hooters floats in from the parking lot. The loudest noise comes when Parker scores the winning goal in the sixth minute. Black Aces fans dream of the day, when they too can swarm into a stadium with thousands of vuvuzelas.
But so goes the story of a few aces among a pack of chiefs. Success is a dream and an expensive one at that.
<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="alignnone size-medium wp-image-31163" src="http://www.forbesafrica.com/app/uploads/2017/05/IMG_7831-300x200.jpg" alt="" width="300" height="200" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/IMG_7831-300x200.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/IMG_7831-600x400.jpg 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/IMG_7831-768x512.jpg 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/IMG_7831.jpg 1024w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" />
A tattered flag bearing a blue ace has seen better days. Holding the flag stubbornly is Njabula Simelane, a die-hard Black Aces fan. Simelane is Mandlesive High School’s art teacher and was so desperate to see his side he brought exam papers with him. He marked them in his seat, shoving them in his backpack just before kick-off.
“I would not have missed this game for anything. Aces playing Chiefs, I’ve waited two years for this,” says an excited Simelane.
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IMG_8030

The Money Game

Lydia Nsekera was widowed when she was 36 years old. As a member of Burundian aristo-cracy, she could have turned to her family for financial support, but she chose not to. Instead, Nsekera took over her husband’s car repair company and used her skills as an internal auditor to turn it into a successful business.
At the same time, the Burundian Football Federation (FFB) was drowning in debt. The association had suffered severe financial mismanagement, was sanctioned by FIFA and faced an uncertain future. It only took the FFB a few months to see the improvements Nsekera had made at her garage before it approached her for assistance.
At face value it was an odd match. Nsekera was not a soccer player. She spent her school days playing basketball and competing in high jump, but had become interested in the game though her father and kept an eye on it over the years. Nsekera was savvy, and the FFB decided it could use someone with her acumen to lift it out of crisis.
When she was asked to accept a nomination for president of the federation, Nsekera was hesitant. She did not doubt her own ability but was unsure if she would be given the free rein she needed to turn around the ailing organization. She agreed to stand, provided she would be allowed to overhaul the structures if she was elected. The FFB agreed and Nsekera won the vote ahead of two male candidates.
A decade later, she became the first – and only – woman to sit on FIFA’s decision-making executive committee in its 109-year history, establishing herself as the pioneer for women’s representation in a man’s world.
“It’s massive for women and I hope our federation and other federations can follow the same path,” says Fran Hilton-Smith, the technical director of the South African Football Association (Safa).
“For example, in South Africa, we only have two women on the national executive committee and one of them is seconded from the PSL. It’s just the reality that football is still male-dominated, but like [Nsekera] has shown, to be successful as a woman, you need to be very determined.”
Hilton-Smith calls it “a miracle”, as it was previously unheard of for a woman to occupy such a senior position in a country’s soccer association. Of FIFA’s 209 member associations, Burundi’s is the only one to have a woman at its helm.
“For her to have been given that position was unprecedented,” says Hilton-Smith.
In her first year at the FFB, Nsekera achieved two major feats. She revived the national league, which had been dormant for three seasons, and rekindled the organization’s relationship with FIFA – to the extent that the soccer governing body agreed to pay for a new office complex for the FFB.
During Nsekera’s tenure, the Burundian league grew to three divisions, FIFA has funded another development project in the country and approved a plan for a national training center in the capital, Bujumbura. The country also held its first women’s soccer championship and the under-17 team won the East African regional competition.
The fortunes of Burundi’s national team have not changed as dramatically. They narrowly missed out on qualifying for the 2008 Africa Nations Cup, but rose from 147th to 104th in the rankings. Now they lie at 124th.
Officials at the FFB do not blame Nsekera for the team’s middling fortunes; instead they have praised her for what she has achieved so far.
“She will go as far as she wants, thanks to her work ethic and authority,” says Jeremie Manirakiza, the executive secretary of the FFB.
By her own admission, Nsekera’s success has come through slog. She has told Associated Press her recipe is simple. “I work, I work and I work.”
With that as her mantra, Nsekera has sat on the executive council of both the East and Central African Football associations, and was part of FIFA’s independent governance commission, as well as its radio and television sub-committee. Her role in furthering the cause of women has extended to serving on the African Women’s Football Commission, the Women’s World Cup Commission and the International Olympic Committee’s Women and Sport Commission.
Promoting the women’s agenda will be one of her focal points on the FIFA executive committee, but it cannot be her only one. The 25-person executive committee makes all the rulings that govern the world game. Members meet at least twice a year and among their most important considerations are the dates and places of FIFA tournaments, not to mention the regulations around how the world body is run.
Given Nsekera’s experience in overhauling an organization, her opinions should carry weight.
“She is on the committee and she will definitely be respected,” Hilton-Smith predicts.
Already, Nsekera has faced naysayers, ironically, other women. A FIFA delegate argues Australia’s Maya Dodd, a former international player and lawyer by trade, who was running against Nsekera, would have been a better choice and that Nsekera was pushed through only because there was much “pandering to the African vote.”
The same members claim Nsekera is not strong enough to take on the job because, “all she ever said at a meeting was: ‘Thank you for taking women’s football seriously’, and that she was only on the executive because Sepp Blatter had handpicked her for the job.
The FIFA boss, who has long supported Nsekera, has described her as a “princess of the game”. Whether or not that is because he wants the backing of the African continent in the future is debatable, but what is certain is that even if Nsekera was given an opportunity driven by someone else’s agenda, she is not one to waste a chance. Just ask the FFB.

Tag: soccer

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