SUFFER WITH SAFA: How an untested 35-year-old got to take charge of South Africa's latest competitive disaster

Left in charge of the nation: Thabo Senong, 35

THE pertinent question after another disastrous weekend for the South African Football Association is this: why did our current national coach not take charge of Bafana Bafana’s humiliating 2-0 defeat against Angola at the Rand Stadium on Saturday?

When Danny Jordaan told me a year ago that Ephraim Mashaba’s main task was to lower the age of the South Africa squad, I never suspected he meant giving Thabo Senong - a 35-year-old coach with a trophy-free CV - full control of the national team.

But that’s the remarkable trick Shaky pulled on Saturday. Apparently Senong, the youngest ever to qualify for Safa's Level 3 Pro Licence in 2011 at 31, picked the CHAN squad (a gathering of unpicked PSL pros, several of them over 30), coached them all week and presided over an embarrassing first leg defeat.

The “Encyclopedia of Youth” even proudly gave the post-match talk, while Shaky hovered in the background, telling us: “I’m sure we can score twice in Luanda, maybe even three.”

In any other nation, the handing of the national squad to a man who has never coached a club would be a major story. There are great managers in the PSL - Gavin Hunt, Steve Komphela, Roger de Sa - who have NEVER been in the Bafana hot-seat.

But for SAFA, it was a mere detail. Another competitive failure after Algeria, Senegal, Ghana, Botswana, Malawi, Gambia and Mauritania hardly ranks on a Richter scale of quakes last week which included:

1 Bafana departing for their Central America tour TWICE. They went to OR Tambo without transit visas for the US and were forced to return to the airport the next morning and fly via Brazil.

2 The team played Costa Rica and Honduras without a recognised striker when non-playing Premier League striker Tokelo Rantie pulled out injured and the Orlando Pirates trio failed to join the squad on a later flight.

3 On their return, Mashaba and five of the technical staff took the early flights home, leaving the home-based players to arrive on Saturday, forcing the postponement of all but one of the weekend’s PSL fixtures.

4 Rantie, who hasn’t even featured on the bench for Bournemouth since their promotion, then went on twitter telling South Africans “you don’t understand football” when Marco Reus wasn’t booed while playing for Germany.

5 Amidst all this, former SAFA employee Ace Kika was handed a SIX YEAR ban for FIFA for his part in the 2010 match-fixing scandal. Their response: “He doesn’t work for the Association any more.”

Rather than conduct a post mortem to ensure such problems never happen again, SAFA just carried on as if nothing had happened. Mashaba issued a few quotes saying how wonderful the Central American tour had been. Bafana tweeted nice pictures and retweeted a few Springboks tweets about the Rugby World Cup.

At no stage did SAFA or Bafana Bafana explain why they had disrupted the entire weekend’s football. A brief apology appeared at 4.30pm on Thursday but by then I’d used other sources - including frustrated Bafana stars left behind by Mashaba in Honduras - to point out that SAFA are actually in breach of FIFA rules by bringing their players home more than 48 hours after an international fixtures.

There were similar shenanigans after AFCON 2015 of course. Humiliation on the field was followed by a FIVE DAY disappearance. The foreign-based players were home and in training by the time the PSL stars got back from Equatorial Guinea.

Sadly, nothing will be done. No questions will be answered truthfully. Did the new Technical Director Neil Tovey play ANY part in all this? Who gave Mashaba permission to put Senong in charge? Why did CONCACAF nations pay all the costs of those abortive flights?

We were just left with Danny Jordaan, the Mayor of Port Elizabeth and President of SAFA, telling us “the real Bafana” will turn things around in those two looming World Cup qualifiers against Angola next month.

While Mr Mashaba charged off, without a word, to an awards ceremony where he had been nominated for South African of the Year.

Close your eyes. Hum the national anthem. Try to find Siyaya TV. Hope nobody else gets banned. Try to track down the Africa Diaspora fund. Pray for three goals in Luanda. Pray the AmaJimbos did okay against Costa Rica at the Under 17 World Cup in Chile last night. Pray for Shaky against Angola in the World Cup qualifiers. And for further miracles against Cameroon in AFCON 2017 qualifying.

But for God’s sake SAFA, don’t tell the people what is really going on. It would be too much.

Hero or villain? How do we judge Shakes Mashaba after a rousing 3-0 win over mighty Mauritius?

SUPERSHAKES: Bafana coach Mashaba

LOOK! In the sky above Dobsonville! Is it a bird? Is it a plane? No, it's SUPERSHAKES! All hail an emphatic 3-0 win over mighty Mauritius hours after half his squad had deserted him. What powers, what magic from our much-maligned Bafana Bafana coach.

But there will be no comic book adulation for Ephraim Mashaba here. Sadly, we cannot abide quite that level of hero-worship after putting three first half goals past the side beaten 7-1 by Ghana a week before.

Yes, Bra Shakes had to cope with a mass withdrawal of players just 48 hours before the game and yes, he had only one training session with this makeshift side before the CHAN qualifier.

But hold on a minute: Bafana played reasonably well with only one dose of Mashaba. Perhaps that's the way to go. Announce the squad a couple of hours before the game and send them out and let them play.

Experienced players who have played under Mashaba say the same as they did when Gordon Igesund was in charge: the training sessions are uninspiring, the team talks are less than adequate. No wonder they wanted to go back to their clubs.

A brief examination of why Orlando Pirates, Bidvest Wits, Orlando Pirates, Ajax Cape Town and Mamelodi Sundowns pulled 12 players out of the squad reveals a deeper malaise than simple club v country politics.

The root cause of last week’s Bafana crisis lies in Mashaba’s insecurity. He chose to keep his strongest squad together after the awful 0-0 home draw against Group M minnows Gambia in an effort to beat Angola in Tuesday’s friendly.

It worked, of course. After endless goalless minutes, Shaky Bafana won the friendly 2-1, ironically on an own goal, though Ayanda Patosi's cunning lob deserved better than that.

But when the players, already in camp for a week in Durban, moved from Cape Town to Johannesburg, everyone knew the big players were supposed to return to their clubs for pre-season, just as we knew Tokelo Rantie would not turn up for the Gambia game after his wedding.

South African football is guilty of poor communication, mismanagement and a first qualifier which will make qualifying for AFCON 2017 tougher than ever with Cameroon and Mauritania to come. We won’t even mention the scramble to find players on Friday and the fact that three of them turned up without passports and were thus rendered ineligible.

So it’s very hard to get too excited about a 3-0 win over Mauritania. Especially when the coach comes out afterwards and complains that his players “need to learn to unlock teams like this, they must be able to score against a side parking the bus”.

But of course, in order to do that, they have to have leadership and tactical guidance from the coach. And of that, there was little sign after a rousing first half in front of a worryingly empty Dobsonville Stadium, right in the heart of Soweto.

Yes, we can celebrate a rare romp against an island nation currently ranked 176 in the world, and as Mashaba rightly said: “We are not scared of them, we do not fear the away leg in two weeks.”

But throughout a week of crisis and turmoil, Mashaba and his media men have failed to explain the full facts of a crisis which left South Africa without a team barely a day before a match scheduled for months.

We were left with a stony silence from Danny Jordaan – the SAFA president who now doubles up as mayor of Nelson Mandela Bay – or PSL chairman Irvin Khoza. Nobody explained why the players returned to their clubs or why the planned use of “fringe players” for CHAN wasn’t implemented until the final hours before Saturday’s game.

In truth, with one point registered at AFCON and first hurdle failures in both the COSAFA Cup and Plate, our game is rapidly sliding backwards. The same old problems are cropping up but most are too scared to explain them away.

Yes, it was great to be 3-0 up at half-time – perhaps even better escape Sports Minister Fikile Mbalula’s ill-judged hype which we were subjected to twice during coverage of the Angola friendly.

And we can celebrate the emergence of two-goal Siphelele Ntshangase and Marc van Heerden - both still officially NFD players with Black Leopards and AmaZulu - as well as the enduring, unbeaten brilliance of captain Itumeleng Khune.

But the truth is, that 0-0 draw against Gambia at home was the important result for Bafana in a turbulent eight day period. Friendly wins and CHAN qualifiers are of no importance. Vision 2022 was what we were promised, but I see no vision at all. Just a blind scramble for available players at the last minute.

I hate being the Grinch who stole CHANmas, but that simply cannot be the way ahead.

Farouk Khan no longer invited to SAFA technical committee: So just WHO decides on the future of South African football... and why?

Not invited: Farouk Khan

FAROUK KHAN, the football guru who discovered Steven Pienaar, May Mahlangu and (most recently) Simphiwe Mtsweni, has found himself mysteriously left out in the cold by the SAFA Technical Committee.

Khan, founder of the widely respected Stars of Africa academy, claims he IS part of the committee which decided the fate of Bafana Bafana head coach Gordon Igesund a fortnight ago – but was not invited to attend. He feels politics are more important than football knowledge when it comes to South Africa’s highest footballing council.

Khan contacted me during the furore over Igesund’s report on the disastrous CHAN tournament. The Technical Committee, chaired by former Mamelodi Sundowns supremo Natasha Tchiclas, decided to let Igesund fulfil his contract until August while launching an investigation in to his part in a pre-tournament row over win-bonuses.

But Khan was not involved in that decision. He wasn’t invited to attend.

Khan, also a popular football analyst on SuperSport, explained:  “It wasn’t out of choice. I was part of the SAFA technical committee when it was launched and I was informed I was on the new committee.

“The Technical Committee is meant to push South African football forward, to advise SAFA on what they should and shouldn’t do.

“For some reason I haven’t been invited to the last couple of meetings that took place. It might be something I said in previous meetings. I just wasn’t invited.

“Maybe there should have been some indication why I wasn’t getting called up any more. Surely SAFA should give you some indication of why they’ve changed their minds.

“I can only assume it’s a case of me not fully endorsing how they are going to go about the development of football in South Africa (the Vision 2022 campaign).

“It’s not possible for us to start by trying to emulate the likes of Spain and Germany. We need to start at the bottom. My point was we need to provide small academies all over the country.

“The ones we used to have, when I got back from Brazil in 1990, have gone now. We have just one real academy, in India, where I travelled recently, they have 11.

“There are so many players who came through the old system. Daine Klate. Bernard Parker. They both started off there.

“But SAFA talk about qualifying thousands of coaches, I don’t have a problem with that. But if I am on the committee I’m not going to be there just to be popular. In those days we didn’t have to go out and look for talent, it came to us.

“When we had the old academies in the provinces and in the schools, we had Boebie Williams and Cavin Johnson doing good work. I’d get these guys down on a regular basis.

“At that time we came across a lad called Pienaar. We found him at an academy in Bosmont. Cavin told me about him and  I said “Bring him along”. He was 12 at the time. Now he’s playing for Everton.

“Today it’s all pie in the sky, a lot of plans being made but nothing is being implemented.

“I’ve always had a very good relationship with Gordon Igesund. He wanted a good structure. We talked about me being involved. I applied for the position of Bafana Under 20 manager, I was interviewed last year. I’m still waiting for an answer.

“The past 20 years, I’ve coached on a daily basis. I don’t need a SAFA job, I’ve got the Stars of Africa academy. People in the country know my ability.

“So many people like me have been sidelined or ignored. And here’s Bafana, can’t qualify for anything unless we’re hosting the tournament.

“Japan only started their professional league in 1993, now they qualify every World Cup, they export plenty of players to Europe.

“We as South Africans should follow suit. We have one of the best leagues, we have a strong structure… the potential brings tears to my eyes. But potential is not enough. We need to nurture this talent.

“Stop talking the talk. Start walking the walk.”

BOLLOCKZ! my innovative football show on www.ballz.co.za airs every Thursday from 9am-11am. See Ballz' channel for our growing library of fascinating football interviews with the big names. 

You can also follow me on www.twitter.com/nealcol for all the latest sports news… and read my “Neal & Pray” column every Tuesday in www.thenewage.co.za.

BOLLOCKZ! is backed by www.topodds.com - have a look at their site for my latest sports betting advice and charity bets for our Wingzofchange charity! 

Response to Gordon Igesund's legal threats: look forward to meeting you in court, Gord

Legal threats: Gordon Igesund

GORDON IGESUND has finally gone a step too far. The Bafana Bafana head coach's fate will be decided on Thursday when he delivers his CHAN report to “Iron Lady” Natasha Tsichlas and her SAFA technical committee.

This morning I received a warning from Igesund’s lawyers saying I can no longer write about their client (the letter can be found at https://workspaces.acrobat.com/?d=74OueIF9mywUN0tZqFigcA). Obviously, these words indicate just how I feel about that. In 40 years of journalism I have never been accused of defamation, let alone warned to keep my opinions to myself. I have only ever written what I feel is in the best interests of the game. ANY game.

On Thursday, Igesund will have to explain just how hosts South Africa managed to fail at the first hurdle in a tournament restricted to home-based players only; how a tournament in which he promised "to go all the way" ended in abject failure.

Throughout the first year of Gordon's reign I was the great supporter; I initiated the oft-trending hash tag #ingordwetrust  in June 2012 and we talked long and hard about that opening game in Brazil, which was narrowly lost 1-0 in Sao Paulo.

In his first public appearance after his appointment in June, 2012, Gordon and I shared a sneaky cigarette at the Sandton Convention Centre as we talked about whether his late assistant Thomas Madigage should wear his famous ZCC hat on the bench for Bafana Bafana.

The ups and downs came thick and fast after that, with his two mandated tasks – reaching the AFCON semi-finals on home soil in 2013 and qualifying for the 2014 World Cup – both ending in failure.

Throughout stinging criticisms on the social networks I stood by Igesund. He was doing his best, I thought, he was looking everywhere for players who could rescue the nation’s ailing footballing reputation.

But then came the Thulani Serero affair. Igesund threw the Ajax Amsterdam midfielder – our highest performing star following Steven Pienaar’s international retirement – out of the team hotel when he complained of groin pain after a long-term injury during training.

I came out in support of Serero – and Igesund spent an hour haranguing me on the telephone. He insisted: “Do you know who I am? I am the head coach of South Africa…” and to my eternal shame I wrote this http://neal-collins.blogspot.com/2013/09/thulani-serero-putting-barcelona-ahead.html after that conversation.

Shaken by Gordon’s response, I then spoke to various people about the Serero incident and wrote this http://neal-collins.blogspot.com/2013/09/thulani-serero-other-side-of-bafanagate.html in an attempt to redress the balance.

From that point on – September 2013 – the relationship with Igesund was broken. I had helped Gordon publicly at every turn on several different platforms and dug hard on the Ethiopians losing points for fielding an ineligible player, backed him to the hilt, but we no longer talked; even after the sensational friendly win over World No1 Spain.


And even when I was forced to shave my head when Gordon lost in a friendly to an amateur Norway line-up http://neal-collins.blogspot.com/2013/01/hair-today-gone-tomorrowhow-i-was.html I had kept the faith. But still not a word from Igesund.

At around this time I became aware of various problems within the Bafana camp. There were allegations of favouritism – as there were surrounding his predecessor Pitso Mosimane – and I touched on the subject, only to be harangued by Mike Makaab, the man who represents both Igesund and Mamelodi Sundowns centre-back Thabo Nthethe.

I was particularly aggrieved when Igesund publicly berated Russian-based defender Siyanda Xulu, 22, over a single pass during training and dropped him from the starting line-up, keeping Nthethe, 29 at the back.

That simmering resentment continued during CHAN, when Nthethe was the only member of a creaking back four to keep his place throughout the tournament. This led to threatening phone calls from Gordon’s son Grant at 2am and demands for an apology from Makaab. Throughout this, Gordon refused to take my calls.

Makaab insisted that I apologise for suggesting he influenced Igesund’s selection. That apology appeared here http://neal-collins.blogspot.com/2014/01/bafana-bafana-apology.html and it’s true, I can’t prove anybody sways our national head coach BUT IN MY OPINION certain players are favoured and nobody disputes that Makaab and Igesund have long maintained an agent/client relationship.

Makaab said an apology would end threats of legal action. He thanked me for doing it publicly on twitter - but this morning the legal letter arrived.

On Wednesday, January 22, as the furore over CHAN failure swept football-speaking South Africa,  I told a national radio station that an agent had visited the team hotel before the Spain game. I argued again that some players are favoured for their affiliation rather than their talent.

SAFA president Danny Jordaan, also appearing on the show, responded: “This will be investigated” and Igesund’s lawyers are angry that their client now appears to be “under investigation”.

Of course, since then, further allegations have arisen against Igesund. On January 26, several Sunday papers suggested Igesund was behind a pre-CHAN bonus row that nearly resulted in a strike. Obviously, Igesund IS "under investigation" and rightly so.

I have no idea what will happen on Thursday. Perhaps Igesund will talk his way out of trouble, pointing out (rightly) he had a sub-standard squad and not enough time to prepare. Or perhaps he will work out his contract and a new regime will begin after the World Cup. Perhaps he will even do the honourable thing and resign for failing to achieve his mandates.

Close shave: Gordon and I after I was
forced to shave my head after
Bafana's Norway defeat

But it is my opinion that South Africa would be best served by not renewing Igesund’s contract – which runs until July this year. He failed – narrowly – to reach the AFCON semi-finals on home soil. He failed – despite Ethiopia’s points deduction – to reach even the play-offs for Brazil 2014. And he failed – utterly – at CHAN.

I also believe Gordon’s selection process throughout CHAN was flawed. He chopped and changed in all positions, leaving players confused and uncertain. Though Gordon described his training sessions as being “like World Cup finals” I heard different, from several sources.

He also promised he would go out to win in the final Group A clash against Nigeria, where Bafana needed just a draw. Instead, he fielded a lone striker and was forced to make a first-half substitution when the Super Eagles took an early 2-0 lead.

There is plenty more that could be said here. But I’ve had enough. The late night phone calls. The threats. The prospect of a first appearance on a defamation charge in 40 years of journalism does not phase me. I should just shut up and apologise, as I did before.

But I have a right to my opinion, based on what I read on the social networks and what I hear from those involved in Igesund's turbulent reign. I have a right to change my mind about Igesund, who won the domestic PSL title with a record four different clubs.

I will not be silenced. I have nothing to lose. I earn less than R7000 a month. I do not own a home and I drive a third-hand Citroen C2. I have no other assets and I certainly can’t afford a lawyer to defend myself.

But if it’s a court battle Igesund wants, bring it on. My only motivation is to improve the standing of South African football. To weed out corruption and favouritism. That is my story.


Full text of the legal letter from Igesund's lawyer can be found HERE:

https://workspaces.acrobat.com/?d=74OueIF9mywUN0tZqFigcA

OH MY GORD! Is this the way ahead for Bafana Bafana after the four-letter word that is CHAN?

Three unwise men: Khune, Mbalula and Igesund

Faster than Itumeleng Khune’s speeding Minnie, more devastating than a Bernard Parker own goal, more dangerous than Willard Katsande’s underpants: the aftershock of South Africa’s ball-numbing defeat against Nigeria’s third team last Sunday has crushed our national spirit.

I warned before the third edition of the “La Orange Championnat d’Afrique des Nations” that CHAN could become a four-letter word for Bafana Bafana head coach Gordon Igesund, fresh from that rousing friendly win over world champions Spain.

(And I have said repeatedly that, given our THREE dodgy Bernard Parker penalties against Mozambique, Mali and Nigeria, the name “Cheetahs” might be a worthwhile alternative for embattled SAFA president Danny Jordaan, desperately trying to persuade new sponsors to back his hapless crusade.)

But Gordon wouldn’t listen. Instead of entering a competition for home-based players fraught with danger modestly, he told us: “I don’t want to sound arrogant and say we’ll win it, but we will go all the way.”

He told us "my training sessions are like World Cup finals" and his players got "goose-bumps when they pull on the jersey". What a lot of BOLLOCKZ! that was.

Before that must-draw battle with Nigeria he told us “Playing for a draw is a dangerous thing for any team to do. My philosophy has always been to play to win” and he promptly put out a team with a single striker and five midfielders.

For all sorts of reasons my initial burst of #ingordwetrust tweets have turned to #gordonout; CHAN was a greater disaster than the World Cup (this one and the last) and AFCON2013 combined. It was an absolute farce in terms of selection, tactics and public utterances.

Danny Jordaan, sharing a forum with me on SAFM last week, said the SAFA technical team – which uniquely features two ladies – will decide Igesund’s fate when he submits his CHAN report with FAILED emblazoned across it next week.

And as we watched Zimbabwe and Nigeria surge in to the last four of CHAN, the inevitability of change has sunk in. My telephonic exchanges with Igesund’s son Grant and his ever-present agent Mike Makaab have been about as pleasant as a Katsande challenge laced with Joey Barton’s boots.

What I believe to be the obvious truth is derided by the Igesund camp as “ridiculous”: I have no proof that Thabo Nthethe, the mediocre Bloemfontein Celtic centre-back who was the only ever-present in the CHAN back four, has some sort of privileged role. I cannot say with court-satisfying certainty that Itumeleng Khune’s ankle injury was far too convenient. Or that Igesund and Makaab’s efforts centring on win bonuses before the tournament amounted to undue pressure on SAFA.

The Sunday Times this morning suggested Igesund was urging the players to go on strike, Igesund said "it's a normal procedure to discuss bonuses" while Jordaan insisted "the issue was sorted out in Zambia at COSAFA in June".

But I can say this. Two coaches – Carlos Queiros and a local PSL boss – were called immediately after the Nigeria defeat. Others from Europe have been sounded out. I have the names. Some stunning, others workmanlike.

And Gordon’s reign, which started with such optimism (particularly from me), has dissolved in to a gritty argument involving ethics, integrity, threats and truth. It should be about football.

If Pitso Mosimane got the boot for picking his favourites after a home draw against Botswana, how do we defend Gordon Igesund? While our Sports Minister lamented our “bunch of useless losers” Igesund said he was “at peace with where I am” and Jordaan was scampering about trying to put the blame for an inexplicable failure on development, rugby-playing schools, Apartheid’s legacy and a lack of qualified coaches.

As I said right from the top. CHAN failure at the first hurdle was devastating for our game. This wasn’t a failure on penalties in the AFCON quarter-finals or a deeply ironic Parker own goal in Ethiopia. Without those three Parker penalties, CHAN would have been a diski disaster.

When the SAFA technical team meet “soon after the CHAN final” to discuss the future of our game going in to qualifiers for AFCON 2015 in Morocco, Jordaan said “we have to make sure we are walking the same path with our national coach”.

After the World Cup with Iran, Queiroz will be available to walk that path. So will experienced PSL coaches like Gavin Hunt, Steve Komphela, “Sir” Clive Barker and Amajita’s Ephraim “Shakes” Mashaba.

Perhaps the best solution is a combination of a top foreign coach – Nigeria’s Steven Keshi and Zambia’s Herve Renard (now with Sochaux in France) have also been mentioned as winners of the last two AFCONs – in conjunction with a top local.

Whether any of these characters can combine to save our pride (and satisfy Nike, the new technical sponsors) nobody can be sure. But they’d be hard-pushed to do worse than the incumbent over the past fortnight. For me, the key is Igesund's refusal to talk to me since I challenged him on the Thulani Serero groin injury affair. He simply won't justify himself, on air or off the record. A sullen refusal to deal with the issues suggests he has no answers.

As our Sports Minister so rightly said: “We must never wake up to this again.”

 BOLLOCKZ! my innovative football show on www.ballz.co.za airs every Thursday from 9am-11am. See Ballz' channel for our growing library of fascinating football interviews with the big names. 

You can also follow me on www.twitter.com/nealcol for all the latest sports news… and read my “Neal & Pray” column every Tuesday in www.thenewage.co.za.

BOLLOCKZ! is backed by www.topodds.com - have a look at their site for my latest sports betting advice and charity bets for our Wingzofchange charity!

PS: This from SAFA president Danny Jordaan on South Africa's possible name change today: "We play Lions, Tigers, Eagles and Elephants. And we come with Boys Boys." 

WE MUST NEVER WAKE UP TO THIS: While the Sports Minister rages, Bafana boss Gordon Igesund is "at peace"

Baffling: raging Mbalula and peaceful Igesund

South Africa’s Sports Minister Fikile Mbalula summed up the mood of the nation yesterday, describing Bafana Bafana as “a generation of players we must forget” after the humiliating 3-1 defeat against Nigeria in Cape Town.

Last night’s abysmal 3-1 defeat against an under-strength Nigeria sees the hosts crash out of the CHAN tournament at the first hurdle with the passionate Mbalula also offering this: “Last night we saw a bunch of losers – unbearable useless individuals. We must never wake up to this."

South Africans are accustomed to failure on home soil after going out of the 2010 World Cup in the group stages and missing out on the AFCON semi-finals in a penalty shoot-out. But the CHAN failure – coming despite a series of bizarre penalty decisions in their favour during their opening two matches – takes failure to a whole new level in a tournament open only to home-based players.

Mbalula raged: “The mediocrity we saw yesterday was disgraceful. This tournament has proved we have a crisis of monumental proportions in our national sport.”

Head coach Gordon Igesund is under increasing pressure despite his recent 1-0 friendly win over world champions Spain.

Starting with just one player up front after promising to “go for a win” Igesund made a series of bizarre selections throughout CHAN and appears incapable of raising South Africa’s stock despite protracted negotiations over availability before the tournament.

Mbalula raged: “In Africa we have won nothing – we are the laughing stock. Even Madiba Magic would not have worked. This generation of players we must forget.

“It is back to the drawing board. SAFA must draw up a detailed plan. They must wake up and smell the coffee.”

Igesund, famous for “having a cup of coffee” with (among others) Everton’s Steven Pienaar when he quit international football, insists: "What went wrong? Nigeria are a better side than us. We've got no excuses. We've got to look at ourselves and say that we weren't good enough."

Highlighting his record of 28 games, 14 wins, 7 draws and 7 losses, Igesund said:  “I just have to continue from where I am. I have a contract until June. I'm at peace with where I am."

But SAFA president Danny Jordaan, hoping to present a winning team to new technical sponsors NIKE next month, admitted: “We are facing three challenges - a new technical sponsor, do we need a new name for the team, and we must review the preparation, philosophy and the technical side of things.”


See also: http://neal-collins.blogspot.com/2014/01/grim-gordon-drinking-at-last-chance.html

BOLLOCKZ! my innovative football show on www.ballz.co.za airs every Thursday from 9am-11am. See Ballz' channel for our growing library of fascinating football interviews with the big names. 

You can also follow me on www.twitter.com/nealcol for all the latest sports news… and read my “Neal & Pray” column every Tuesday in www.thenewage.co.za.

BOLLOCKZ! is backed by www.topodds.com - have a look at their site for my latest sports betting advice and charity bets for our Wingzofchange charity!

Our training sessions are like World Cup finals: How Gordon Igesund aims to take South Africa all the way

NO NONSENSE: Gordon Igesund

BAFANA BAFANA coach Gordon Igesund has revealed the watchwords in his quest for CHAN silverware as South Africa prepare for their vital Group A clash with Mali tomorrow night.

Igesund’s mantra involves a series of two-word couplets: man-management; no-nonsense; goose-bumps.

Talking on www.ballz.co.za (see video below), Igesund – fresh from that opening 3-1 win over Mozambique, said: “In the modern game of football, I think 70 percent of it is to man-manage players who are paid a lot of money, they are celebrities. You have to let them know you are a no-nonsense person.

“Give them the respect they deserve, but they need to apply themselves I training… and from the moment they put the national jersey on.

“One thing about the Bafana team right now, what makes me very proud, is they all want to play, they’re proud to be a part of it. They want to be here. To play for millions of people. I tell them they must get goose-bumps when they go out to represent their nation.

“My training sessions are like World Cup finals. You must see it. That’s the attitude all my players have. Nobody has a right to be selected. They all want to be part of the starting line-up. There are no automatic choices.

“It’s all very good and respectful, but they compete.

“And the most important thing is, we’re scoring goals. That’s what people want to see. They want to see Bafana fighting… and scoring. Playing the kind of football they enjoy.”

Asked which is his favourite venue for Bafana games, Igesund said: “As a coach, I love the Cape Town Stadium and the Moses Mabhida… but that’s taking nothing away from Soccer City. We have such good stadiums. But I’d say we get the best support in Cape Town. The audience is a complete mix, a Rainbow Nation coming together.

“Slowly but surely, no matter where we are, if we play the right kind of football, the fans will come with us.

“I’m just so grateful for the support we’re getting in Cape Town. We had 26,000 for that opening game, let’s hope they stay with us for Mali and Nigeria and beyond Group A.”

And that’s a good thing. Mali tomorrow and Nigeria on Sunday will be played in the Mother City and if they top the group, the quarter-final will also take place at the Cape Town Stadium (January 25) with a semi-final in Mangaung (Jan 29) before a hoped-for return to Cape Town for the final on February 1.

With Igesund promising “two or three changes” for the Mali game, he added: “The guys are very pleased with that opening 3-1 win over Mozambique, it took a lot pressure off us. The players are under huge scrutiny, passions are high, people say we HAVE to win the tournament.

“They coped with that very well on Saturday, coming back from 1-0 down – after training, I can say everybody is really looking forward to the second game.

"I am contemplating making changes, Mali is a totally different game, I want to have a bit more pace going forward.

"We are playing against a very good and physical team so we have been working hard on keeping the ball, making quick passes because we don’t want to get into a tussle with them as we will come off second best.

"We need to be clever and use the ball well and need to be more penetrative than we were in the first match. So the mission is very clear – we have to get a result in this game so we know where we are.

"I was quite surprised how impressive Mali was against Nigeria, we have our work cut out for us.

“There are some very, very good teams here for CHAN. Morocco have eight of the Raja Casablanca players who played against Bayern Munich in the World Club Cup final in December.”

But as he has said form the start, Igesund believes a combination of no-nonsense, goose-bumps and man-management could end with long-awaited success: "We're not being arrogant saying we want to win this CHAN tournament, what we are saying is that we're going to be very competitive and I think we can go all the way.”

BOLLOCKZ! my own football show on www.ballz.co.za, restarts after the Christmas break on Thursday from 9am. See the Ballz channel on www.YouTube.com for our growing collection of interviews with the big names in South African football.

You can also follow me on www.twitter.com/nealcol for all the latest sports news… and read my “Neal and Pray” column every Tuesday in www.thenewage.co.za.

BOLLOCKZ! is backed by www.topodds.com - have a look at their site for my latest sports betting advice and how we are doing in using @thumperpigeon's R5,000 to make money for the Ballz charity WINGZ OF CHANGE.

CHANUARY COULD BE CHANTASTIC: Kekana thunderbolt lights up a hungry footballing nation

CHANTASTIC: Kekana (centre) celebrates his cracker

CHANUARY. That’s what we call it when the footballing New Year starts with the much-maligned third edition of the Championnat d’Afrique des Nations.

In English? The African Nations Championship. But calling it the ANC would be a little confusing given the unveiling of the ruling party’s manifesto over the weekend.

Poorly marketed, widely disrespected, there appeared to be no CHANce this tournament would really inspire our Rainboo Nation – until THAT sublime moment from Mamelodi Sundowns midfielder Hlomphe Kekana. CHANtastic!

With the opening game against Mozambique in Cape Town locked at 1-1 after a series of habitually missed chances for Gordon Igesund’s Bafana Bafana, Kekana’s Kracker left visiting goalkeeper Soarito cartwheeling through the sky as his 35-yard hammerblow hit the back of the net.

And suddenly CHAN was up and running. A 3-1 opening triumph. With Mali beating AFCON holders Nigeria 2-1 later on the night, the tournament – limited to home-based players – had suddenly blossomed. With R80,000 win bonuses, full international caps and FIFA ranking points on offer, that’s as it should be after the unseemly row over player availability.

For a nation exhausted by hosting (2009 Confederations Cup, 2010 Fifa World Cup, 2013 Africa Cup of Nations), Igesund and SAFA were under huge pressure to get off to a winning start in a tournament where only the winners emerge from the qualifying pools.

Either side of Kekana’s Kracker, Bernard Parker – ironically one of the players Kaizer Chiefs general manager Bobby Motaung wanted withdrawn from CHAN - scored his 20 and 21^st goals for the nation, the first a hotly disputed penalty, the second a neat left-foot finish. A troubled first half was forgotten, a rousing win had the Cape Town audience on its feet.

Igesund grins:  "History tells you a win in the first game gives you a 70 percent chance of qualifying. At AFCON and the World Cup, we drew our first game, it was difficult from there onwards, an opening draw puts a lot of pressure on the team.

"Winning today gives the players lots of confidence, the fans get behind us and fill the stadium up when we play, they start believing again.

"If you're creating chances like we did, you have to be happy. We had 20 chances and scored three. We always looked like we were going to get one after they Mozambique scored. I was very confident.

“Sometimes you watch a team play and they don't score a goal and they haven't even created any opportunities. Yes, we had a major problem with scoring goals but we haven't got that problem any more!"

Mali, now officially the SERIOUS rivals in Group A, loom on Wednesday at the merry Cape Town Stadium with Igesund insisting: “Look it wasn’t a classic performance. But we had control of the game and we scored two fantastic goals – especially Kekana’s.

"It was the kind of goal you dream about. When Kekana struck it, I thought: “He’s taken the wrong choice there, he’s a bit far out” but when you saw it fly, you could see it had goal written all over it.

"In the first-half I thought we played okay – we didn’t really penetrate and I thought we were unfortunate to concede the early goal (Itumeleng Khune admitted afterwards he slipped and fell short of the deflected shot).

"But in the second half I was very happy, we kept possession, didn't panic and kept plugging way and were rewarded with the three points which was crucial for us."

With Thato Mokeke, Buhle Mkhwanazi, Lindokuhle Mbatha and Asavela Mbekile all making their full Bafana debuts, Igesund argues: "That also excited me today. Sometimes debutants can get a little nervous out there, but I was pleased that we were able to bring them on. We believe in these younger players; slowly but surely you have to do it, like we're doing it right now... I was very pleased for them."

 BOLLOCKZ! my own football show on www.ballz.co.za, restarts after the Christmas break on Thursday from 9am. See the Ballz channel on www.YouTube.com for our growing collection of interviews with the big names in South African football.

You can also follow me on www.twitter.com/nealcol for all the latest sports news… and read my “Neal and Pray” column every Tuesday in www.thenewage.co.za.

BOLLOCKZ! is backed by www.topodds.com - have a look at their site for my latest sports betting advice and how we are doing in using @thumperpigeon's R5,000 to make money for the Ballz charity WINGZ OF CHANGE.

La 3e Orange Championnat d’Afrique des Nations 2014: Will CHAN be a four-letter word for Gordon Igesund

Under pressure: Bafana Head Coach Gordon Igesund

CHAN. A year ago nobody knew what those four letters meant. Now they spell danger for South Africa coach Gordon Igesund.

Officially, CHAN is a shortening of “La 3e Orange Championnat d’Afrique des Nations 2014” an African Championship for home-based players – no of those highly-paid stars from Europe allowed.

On the surface of it, the tournament sounds a great idea and for the long-suffering Igesund, fresh from that earth-shaking win over FIFA’s No1 Spain.

Who could ask for more: Orlando Pirates have just reached the final of the African Champions League, our glittering PSL is considered the richest league in Africa and Bafana get to play at the magnificent Cape Town Stadium, where fans turn up to watch paint dry.

But the chance of an international football tournament being won on home soil for the first time since 1996 has been shaken by that unseemly spat between SAFA, the PSL and our greatest footballing franchise, Kaizer Chiefs.

We all know the details. The PSL dumped the top-of-the-table clash between Mamelodi Sundowns and Chiefs slap bang in the middle of the CHAN tournament and despite an agreement forged with SAFA, Bobby Motaung (and quietly, Jose Ferreira) threatened to withdraw their stars.

But following Saturday’s sparkling statement of patriotic fervour from SAFA, all 23 members of the squad were present and correct before the opening CHAN clash against Mozambique on January 11. Kaizer over-ruled Bobby. Hooray!

But wait. The fact is Igesund now finds himself under huge pressure to emerge from Group A (Mali and AFCON champions Nigeria complete the group) before surging to CHAN silverware. It feels like South Africa has bent over backwards for SAFA and the nation is demanding the ultimate result.

But the truth is, this is not a great Bafana squad. Orlando Pirates? Their African crusaders weren’t even considered. Our talented foreign contingent, as per the rules, are absent.

Igesund, rather than turn to the Amajita who recently won the COSAFA Under 20 tournament under Ephraim Shakes Mashaba in Lesotho, finds himself trying to persuade his aging squad to overcome all obstacles. Anything less and the calls for his head will rise to a crescendo despite THAT glorious triumph over Spain (which has actually seen Bafana slip one place to 62 in the FIFA rankings).

Igesund himself is full of platitudes: “At the end of the day this is our national team; it’s the national team for the people. We want to do well, try and get as many players as we can to compete and win things.

“We are trying to change the mentality of the people out there. We want to start having a winning mentality.”

The truth is, Gordon, it’s win or bust. Selecting the old favourites and forcing them to play in the middle of an already chaotic PSL season without drafting in a few promising youngsters could spell trouble. Serious trouble. 


BOLLOCKZ! my own football show on www.ballz.co.za, restarts after the Christmas break on Thursday from 9am. See the Ballz channel on www.YouTube.com for our growing collection of interviews with the big names in South African football.

You can also follow me on www.twitter.com/nealcol for all the latest sports news… and read my “Neal and Pray” column every Tuesday in www.thenewage.co.za.

BOLLOCKZ! is backed by www.topodds.com - have a look at their site for my latest sports betting advice and how we are doing in using @thumperpigeon's R5,000 to make money for the Ballz charity WINGZ OF CHANGE.

An air of resignation: The son goes down as Kaizer Chiefs stars finally join the Bafana squad

Family business: Kaizer and Bobby

In the real world when a junior official publicly contradicts his well-loved Chief Executive Officer, the axe falls with alarming speed.

At Kaizer Chiefs, when Football Manager Bobby Motaung attempts to tear up the agreement set by his father Kaizer – the club’s owner – a stony silence falls.

We know Bobby well. In theory. I’ve spoken to his brother Junior and his sisters Jessica and Kemiso. But somehow I’ve never got through to the oldest surviving brother in the Motaung clan.

We know that he refused to resign a couple of years ago, saying he didn’t need to a CV to get the job under his father: “This is a family business,” he told us "I will be here as long as this company exists."

Then there were the TWO arrests over the Mbombela Stadium scandal. I spoke to Paul Ramaloko, the Hawks captain, after the bizarre episode at Nelspruit Magistrates Court when he arrested Bobby for the second time as he left court following a preliminary hearing.

At the time, and I remember it well, I asked Paul if there was anything he could add to the story, recognising how difficult prosecuting the son of the nation’s most popular footballer would be. Captain Ramaloko’s reply remains etched in my mind: “Neal, do you really think I would do this without a watertight case against him?”

But of course, when the charges of fraud, corruption and forgery came to court, magistrate Roelf Smith removed the case from the roll as "he could see no progress being made". The case - and two deaths linked to the Mbombela Stadium debacle - remain undealt with, hanging like a sword of Damocles over South Africa’s national game.

This is what I wrote at the time: http://neal-collins.blogspot.com/2013/06/charges-dropped-sorry-bobby-motaung.html.

Throughout all that, Bobby remained in place. Acting not just as Football Manager or Kaizer Chiefs but as a makeshift spokesman for the club, an enforcer, the man who made all the transfers. There was the bizarre severing of ties with the popular former captain Jimmy Tau too.

After long-term injury, Jimmy had been told by double-winning coach Stuart Baxter that he would get a new contract at the club as he fought his way back to fitness and played a couple of reserve games at the end of last season.

But almost as soon as Baxter’s flight had departed for an off-season break in Britain, Bobby summoned Jimmy and told him his services were no longer required. That story is documented HERE http://neal-collins.blogspot.com/2013/06/discarded-by-kaizer-chiefs-jimmy-tau.html.

But all this pales into insignificance in the light of the events of the past fortnight. After his father Kaizer, along with Sundowns supremo Patrice Motsepe, had agreed to release his players to Bafana Bafana for the CHAN tournament in January, Bobby immediately came out and said Chiefs would do no such thing.

Earlier this week he released a further statement through the club’s website insisting no AmaKhosi stars would be release until AFTER the top-of-the-table clash against Mamelodi Sundowns on January 23. With the tournament starting in Cape Town on January 11, that would have left South Africa's squad five short throughout the group stages.

With dangerous neighbours Mozambique, Mali and reigning African champions Nigeria to play in Group A, that would have been simply unacceptable.

And with Gordon Igesund’s squad of 23 already officially submitted, SAFA president Danny Jordaan had no choice but to insist the five Chiefs players should be there from the start. On the telephone to me on Thursday night, he said he had written to FIFA, he insisted it was possible to get the five Chiefs players banned for the Sundowns game.

And of course, with Sundowns doing the honourable thing and releasing their players for CHAN, Chiefs – and the grand old man Kaizer – were forced in to a corner. Chincha Guluva, as always, did the honourable thing and promised to release his players as he had agreed in a tele-conference with SAFA three weeks ago.

Jordaan’s Saturday statement – including the line “Our gratitude goes out to Mr Kaizer Motaung and Kaizer Chiefs for their long-standing and unstinting support of the national team” – is clearly placatory, in the interests of the nation.

The social networks will debate the rights and wrongs of the situation until the cows come home, but the fact is Bobby publicly contradicted – even embarrassed – his father with his outspoken rebuttal of the CHAN policy agreed with SAFA, the game’s ruling body.

It’s fair to say Bidvest Wits only released their players late too. And that Orlando Pirates have somehow escaped the entire debacle while their chairman, also in charge of the PSL, was never asked to explain how Chiefs v Sundowns found its way on to the fixture list in mid-CHAN.

But those are side issues. In the real world, Bobby would be forced to resign. In our little world, the son of the boss will no doubt carry on without a CV or an apology. And that simply can’t be right.

BOLLOCKZ! my own football show on www.ballz.co.za, restarts after the Christmas break on Thursday from 9am. See the Ballz channel on www.YouTube.com for our growing collection of interviews with the big names in South African football.

You can also follow me on www.twitter.com/nealcol for all the latest sports news… and read my “Neal and Pray” column every Tuesday in www.thenewage.co.za.

BOLLOCKZ! is backed by www.topodds.com - have a look at their site for my latest sports betting advice and how we are doing in using @thumperpigeon's R5,000 to make money for the Ballz charity WINGZ OF CHANGE.