The gripping PSL 2011/12 season is over, and congratulations are in order to league champions Orlando Pirates and the SA cup winners SuperSport Unites are in order. The two teams now must carry the momentum forward into the CAF competitions, a territory that has almost become a taboo subject for South Africa football fraternity.
It boggles the mind how SA football expects to progress and “conquer” the world when it totally ignores the continental championships. We have dreams of matching the biggest clubs in the world, as can be seen with the overwhelming excitement when the Vodacom Challenge comes, with the invitation of one overseas club, more often from England.
The Vodacom Challenge, which is a private enterprise of Orlando Pirates, Kaizer Chiefs and their jersey sponsor Vodafone, has proved to be an unnecessary distraction to SA football. People get so excited over it, forgetting that it is only a friendly involving a European side in its pre-season tour. The visitors obviously never exert themselves, playing just hard enough to avoid defeat. So this is not the place to meet Manchester United and City, Barcelona, Bayern Munich or Inter Milan strength for strength.
The only way that can be achievable for an African club is to win the CAF Champions League, which qualifies the winner for the CAF Club World Cup. Other meetings with the world’s best will remain just that: exhibition matches. South Africa has under-achieved in CAF competitions because we simply just don’t take them seriously.
One had to look at the emptiness of the Peter Mokaba Stadium, where Black Leopards stopped Nigeria’s Warri Wolves in the Confederation Cup earlier this month, to understand the national psyche on CAF. Just about 1000 fans arrived, despite the perfect weather conditions and significance of the official status of the international match-up. It suffices to say Leopards were lonely at home as they magnificently overhauled their 3-1 deficit with a 2-0 victory, to advance on away goals rule.
The lack of respect for CAF contests is not within the fans alone, it affects local officials and media as well. Editorial space for African football is often either negligible or absent in local newspapers. Even when Leopards, SA’s remaining club in the current CAF season, leave for away matches very few people know about it because the story is just not there.
For the record, the Limpopo-based Leopards will meet Al-Marreikh of Sudan in the last-16 round. Next month the club travels to the sauna of Omdurman, the base of Sudan’s best two – Merreikh and Al-Hilal, which ironically is also in contention in the Confed Cup – to seek a placing in the group stage quarterfinals. It is difficult to win there playing in 40 degrees Celsius. The best Leopards can do is to contain damage against a good team like their host. The second leg will be in Polokwane on July 1.
Orlando Pirates and SuperSport United will line up for the the editions of the Champions League and Confed Cup in February 2013. Between now and then the players and the technical staffs of the two teams must put that thought in their minds and begin mental preparation from the moment the new PSL season starts. For now everybody must enjoy their holidays after a grueling 2011/12 season.
In conclusion, things like the Vodacom Challenge and the new Carling Black Label are trips taking SA football nowhere. At least the old Vodacom Challenge, for which African top clubs were invited, made a lot more sense as it put us closer to where we are supposed to be – brilliance on the continent.
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