Sport Matters

Today South Africa begins what promises to be the country's most successful campaign in the IAAF World Championship. The world athletics showpiece in London has all the ingredients of a masterpiece and, even better, Team SA looks good enough to add value and improve on previous performances. Since readmission to world sports in the early 1990s, SA has had poor pickings in the IAAF event, returning its better marks in 2009 (Berlin) and 2011 (Daegu, Korea). Three medals in Berlin and four in Daegu served mostly to save face but they can't be noted to be counting among the best of the best. It is fitting however to compliment those athletics who gave their all for the country previously. This time we have a squad that, on paper, has the potential to return with six medals or more. Caster Semenya was involved in the feats of those two editions, winning women's 800m gold in Berlin and silver in Daegu. Interestingly, she is among favourites to win gold medals in London. E...

Unhappy times... Orlando Pirates supporters are having it tough as their beloved club flounders. Orlando Pirates supporters are looking forward to today's Soweto derby with a high level of despondency. In fact, to say they are looking forward to this match is somewhat inaccurate, but somehow they feel obliged to pay attention to the match because of tradition and historical rivalry with the opponent, Kaizer Chiefs.  The Soweto derby is the biggest soccer match in South Africa, and one of the biggest on the continent. Though the encounter this afternoon is an exhibition match under the guise of the Carling Black Label Cup, when  Pirates and Chiefs meet there are no friendly pleasantries exchanged. The derby is a fight for bragging rights, and very little else matters. For Pirates, the overwhelming sadness enveloping their supporters is not so much from the bad season they had, playing the worst football ever by the club's standards.  Yes, it was bad and ended with ...

Changed man... Tebogo Langerman revealed how he had in the past undermined the importance of CAF club championship until most recently. All eyes in African football are on Mamelodi Sundowns this weekend, as the South African and continental champions make their Fifa Club World Cup debut. Sundowns meet host and Japan champs, Kashima Antlers, on Sunday December 11. The Antlers, from Ibaraki Prefecture on Japan's main island Honshu, are simply the glamour boys of Japanese football. They have won that country's premier league eight times, an no other team in the J League has won the title more than three times. So, it's clear Sundowns quarterfinal opponents in the Fifa tournament are no pushovers. The match taking place in 72 300 capacity Yokohama International Stadium, the home ground of Antlers' fiercest rivals F Merinos, does not proviude offer any reprieve because the Japanese seek success for their country in this tournament. Naturally I want success for Sun...

THE fact that Mamelodi Sundowns are back in contention for Africa club honours after they were knocked out twice already in two competitions this year came as both good and bad news. That Sundowns have been reinstated in the 2016 CAF Champions League is good for the club president's desire for his team to be crowned African champions. Patrice Motsepe has thrown more than enough for that dream to come true, only for his team to come short.  This year Sundowns did not even reach the goup stage of the continent's premier club competition, after they were outfoxed by DR Congo's Vita Club in round three. The Kinshasa proceeded to the quaterfinal's groups stage as a result, but were later thrown out because they had fielded an ineligible player.  That's how Sundowns were called back to replace Vita. Their return is also good news for SA football ambition, which is now desperation,  to be counted among the best in  Africa. We once won the Africa club title, back in ...

Soccer genes... Jonathan Bolingi Merikani, DR Congo striker, spent time at Jomo Cosmos when he was a teen. Today he boasts gold medals from CAF Champions League and CHAN TODAY the son of former Jomo Cosmos goalkeeper is an African champion, again. This time following DR Congo's 3-0 victory over Mali in the final of the CHAN (African Nations Championship) on Sunday evening. And to add the cherry on top, Jonathan Bolingi Merikani also scored on the fine evening in the Rwandan capital of Kigali. The 21-year-old Bolingi also has a CAF Champions League gold medal, with TP Mazembe of Lubumbashi . He is the son of Mpangi Merikani, former Jomo Cosmos goalkeeper. When still a teen Bolingi also spent time at Cosmos, where his father is still employed as goalkeepers coach.  Mpangi Merikani, now that's an interesting name from the past. The slightly built keeper was more known for his antics between the posts during Jomo Cosmos' glory years more than 15 years ago, doing som...

Golden touch. . . Tout Pouissant Mazembe of DR Congo are African champions for the fifth time. LAST weekend when most of South Africa's soccer public was obsessing over the Soweto Derby, between Kaizer Chiefs and Orlando Pirates in the semifinals of the domestic cup called Telkom KO, a bigger cup story in Africa unfolded without much notice in SA. That's not unusual for SA, but this time someone powerful and influential has spoken. The chairman of both Orlando Pirates FC and SA's Premier Soccer League Irvin Khoza attended the final match in Lumbubashi last Sunday, when Mazembe beat USM Alger of Algeria 2-0 to take the title on 4-1 aggregate. The enthusiasm for the game in Congo has clearly revitalised Khoza, who this week warned South Africans to take Africa seriously. He's right. It does not make make sense that African football champions are crowned and yet up to 80 per cent of football followers in SA do not know about such a big moment, and yet we call o...

Steely... Strong and confident approach is what Pirates need against Al Ahly  Tonight Orlando Pirates get the grandest chance to undo all the wrong things about South African teams when out playing on the continent, more so in north and west Africa. Pirates take a narrow lead to the second leg tie of their CAF Confederation Cup semifinal against Al Ahly in Egypt. For many years, as this blog has argued, that poor preparation and small mindedness had been the downfall of SA football on the continent. Bafana Bafana fiasco in Mauritania and Pirates 4-1 hammering in Egypt by Zamalek are the most recent examples. South African clubs' homework about teams and locations they travel to had been appalling. It had been nauseating to hear SA players and team officials talk about "shocking conditions" when arriving home from a fixture in another part of Africa.  The real shock is not the conditions, but the temerity of our teams to travel without comprehensive information abou...