GOODBYE DOLLY! Why South Africa's shining talent must go to Europe, before it's too late

SOUTH AFRICA'S BEST PLAYER: Keagan Dolly

Neymar da Silva Santos Júnior was born on February 5, 1992. He has won 75 international caps for Brazil and scored 50 goals for his country.

Keagan Larenzo Dolly was born on January 22, 1993. He has played 4 times for South Africa and scored two memorable goals against Gambia last year.

Neymar Jnr, born in Mori Das Cruzes near Sao Paulo, played for Santos in his home nation until the age of 21 when he finally accepted Barcelona’s advances.

Dolly, born in Westbury near Johannesburg, played for Ajax Cape Town before moving to Mamelodi Sundowns. Nearly 24 (the same age as Neymar), he was transferred for a reported R6m, has had offers of R10m from Europe, and now finds himself unable to move overseas.

Like Neymar before he left Brazil, Dolly has won just about everything domestically. League, both cups and this season, the African Champions League.

The crowning glory came just last week when Keagan was named in the CAF Africa XI ahead of Arsenal’s uber talented Alex Iwobi, who was named as a substitute.

Curiously, though his €750,000 buy-out clause has been met by both French club Montpellier and Greek giants Olympiacos, Dolly remains in South Africa with his coach Pitso Mosimane - last week voted Africa’s Coach of the year - saying “Keagan could do with another season in the PSL.”

In the same breath, Mosimane admits: “If Dolly gets the chance to go overseas, then he must go.”

All very confusing for Dolly, who should have won at least 30 Bafana Bafana caps in his short career, not to mention a move to Europe three years ago, if South African football REALLY wanted local youngsters to thrive internationally.

But a combination of the now-defunct Ephraim “Shakes” Mashaba’s bizarre national selection policies and the PSL’s Dispute Resolution Chamber are denying Dolly the chance to be South Africa’s Neymar.

After his debut against Sudan in 2014, Mashaba chose to leave Dolly behind until close to  the end of his disastrous AFCON 2017 qualification failure. The DRC? They chose to allow Sundowns to change the buy-out clause on the contract he signed in 2015 - and new deal the PSL insisted on as there were “registration problems” when Dolly went back to his old club Ajax Cape Town on loan.

The DRC chose to accept Sundowns claim that they had “made a mistake” with the buy-out clause in Dolly’s new contract, effectively rendering all future PSL contracts disputable. A lamentable decision.

Has any other business EVER been allowed to claim they “blundered” on a signed contract? What would Masanadawana’s Champions League rivals think if they thought Dolly’s contract was not worth the paper it was written on?

In fact, Sundowns altered the eight sentences of the buy-out clause NINE times before Dolly was brought in - without his representatives - to sign a new five-year deal in August 2015. Sundowns were aware of every word in the new contract, they demanded it. They got it.

The old contract demanded a £1.5m buy-out, which is now the fee which will have to be met by and new suitors following Dolly’s Africa XI selection.

Effectively his value - thanks to an incredible DRC decision - has risen from R10m to R22m which would be a modern South African record equal to the £1.5m record paid by Bournemouth for Malmo’s Tokelo Rantie three years ago. And we all know how that ended.

With South Africa languishing at 60 in the FIFA rankings, no English club would approach that figure - especially with Dolly failing to play anywhere near the required 80 percent of South Africa’s competitive fixtures over the past two years. A work permit is out of the question for any South African right now. At any price.

Many said Neymar’s move to Europe came a little late at 20. Dolly is nearly 24. And unless somebody looks long and hard at the PSL’s DRC - who also found against Siboniso Pa Gaxa when Kaizer Chiefs had actually tweeted about his "until 2018" contract - South Africa’s brightest star is unlikely to achieve is full potential.

What next? An appeal to SAFA and even the international Court of Arbitration for Sport. Expensive. Disruptive. Not recommended.

So here’s the verdict from one who is not frightened to speak out against corruption and injustice: the DRC are not a fair, objective body fit to judge on player contracts.

With the same people representing Kaizer Chiefs and Sundowns as well as the PSL against players, justice is currently unavailable. The DRC is, as we like to say in South Africa, “captured”. 

Dolly has won all he is likely to win at Sundowns. Even if he goes overseas, the new South African coach, if he’s sensible and not guided by sinister forces like Mashaba, will have no choice but to pick South Africa’s brightest “young” talent (some would consider 24 middle-aged in football terms).

Dolly has nothing to lose. He has already had to foot a mammoth R200,000 legal bill in an unsuccessful attempt to set himself free. Remarkable that, given it was Sundowns who admitted to making the contractual “error”.

With at least two fresh bids on the table following the DRC’s bizarre decision, my advice Keagan? Go to Greece, France or wherever the footballing road takes you. South Africa doesn’t have a single player (barring the veteran Steven Pienaar at Sunderland) in any of the big leagues.

That hasn’t happened for years. It’s time for Keagan Dolly to make the break. Before it’s too late.

May Mahlangu: Sadly, South Africa's only current world class player won't be playing against the Ivory Coast on Saturday

When Bafana Bafana turn out for the Nelson Mandela Challenge against the Ivory Coast on Saturday, South Africa's best current player will be inexplicably absent.
While captain Steven Pienaar struggles to get a game for Spurs, centre-back Bongani Khumalo languishes on loan at Reading and veteran striker Benni McCarthy - 34 this week - has opted out of international football, May Mahlangu can rightly claim to be the Rainbow Nation's only world class player right now.
Currently plying his trade with Swedish outfit Helsingborgs IF, Mahlangu was awarded Sweden's Player of the Year accolade at a lavish ceremony on Monday night - barely 24 hours after scoring a wondergoal and being named Man of the Match in the Swedish Cup final last weekend.
While beleaguered Bafana coach Pitso Mosimane dithers over his selection to play Africa's No1 ranked side in Port Elizabeth this weekend, he continues to ignore Mahlangu, who has been selected for Shakes Mashaba's troubled Baby Bafana - the under 23 side formerly known as AmaGlugGlug are headed to the Olympics in London next year - for the pair of friendlies in Algeria on November 12 and 15. Sadly, due to "injuries" and "non-co-operation from the clubs" that squad currently boasts just eight players as of last night.
But that won't trouble Mahlangu, after a season which has seen his club win the Swedish League and Cup double for the first time since 1941. His performances alongside established star Adrian Gashi at the Olympia Stadium have been little short of sensational - a Scandinavian Lionel Messi some say.
Farouk Khan, the scout who first spotted Mahlangu as a talented but penniless orphan in Secunda, Mpumalanga over a decade ago, said on South Africa's 702 radio station this morning: "We spotted May early on. Both his parents had died so he came to live with us for six years.
"When Helsingborgs came along they were first interested in signing a certain striker called Siyabonga Nomvete, one of our players, about ten years ago. But when they arrived and saw the standard of our academy, they decided not to buy Nomvete and chose to invest in our teenagers instead."
Khan, who runs a scouting school known as the Stars of Africa Academy, also unearthed Tokelo Rantie, the Orlando Pirates super-sub who came to light a fortnight ago with a superb late winner against Jomo Cosmos in Port Elizabeth.
Khan added: "Helsingborgs helped us financially for some years before the Swedish Krona devalued and they had to pull out. But they always kept an eye on our youngsters. And then they asked May to go over and play. He made his debut in August 2009.
"It's been fabulous for him this season. He was the best player, never got substituted and he scored in their cup final, now he has been voted their player of the year by the players and the journalists.
"He isn't a big lad (173cm, 5ft 8in) but he is quick, very quick. And so fit. We did the usual tests on him and realised that if he wasn't a footballer, he could easily be a marathon runner. That's how impressive his fitness readings were. The best we have ever seen."
Fitness is only half of it. Last Sunday, May Sifiwe Mahlangu, 22 on May 1 (hence the name), produced that cup final super-strike, beating six defenders to find the net after starting a run from his own half as Helsingborgs beat rivals Kalmar FF 3-1 to complete a magnificent treble. They won the Super Cup at the start of the season and ran away with the Allsvenskan League title as Mahlangu played in every minute of the 26 games he was available for. His side lifted their first championship in 14 years without losing a home game and finished five points clear of nearest rivals AIK Solna as they secured a Champions League place for next season.
Helsingborg coach Conny Karlsson, installing him in the attacking midfield role at the start of the season after he played 19 games in his first term at the club, said he would build his squad around the unknown South African - and he never regretted a moment. Mahlangu scored five goals in 35 games and produced the most assists in the league.
Karlsson purred: "With Mahlangu, we have won everything you can win in Sweden this season. Somebody may match that one day, but you can't do any better."

Perhaps somebody should tell the unfortunate Pitso. While he attempts to juggle the same old bunch who failed (despite the glorious victory dance) to qualify for next year's African Cup of Nations in Equatorial Guinea and Gabon, Mahlangu and Ajax Amsterdam's Thulani Serero remain with the juniors. Curious.