‘BLACK SUNDAY’: A SOBERING REALITY ABOUT OUR FOOTBALL

My dearest readers ... After the ‘Black Sunday’, in which our dominant team, Mbabane Swallows Football Club lost 3-1 to Tunisia’s CS Sfaxien when it mattered most, realistically, blowing their African dream to smithereens and the national team, Sihlangu bombing out of the annual COSAFA Castle Cup 2017 following a 2-1 defeat to a classy Zimbabwe, I am not alone in feeling completely drained.

I feel like I have had an overdose on Fanta Grape and Niknaks. I am not in doubt that I am speaking on behalf of many true soccer fanatics in this country who must be feeling, at the end of this Swallows fantastic run in the African sojourn, as if they had spent months inside the whirling drum of a tumble-dryer. If I were to depict a picture of the scenario, I would draw the picture of a smiling man with tears of sadness in his eyes! The contrast is simple astounding if you bring the national team, Sihlangu’s scenario after winning a bronze medal in last year’s COSAFA Castle Cup under the tutelage of Harries ‘Madze’ Bulunga.

I might not have been at Somhlolo National Stadium on Sunday but a colleague whose views I take seriously told me the Tunisian’s approach and game management overawed Swallows – tactically. Two hours later, a vintage Zimbabwe’s Brave Warriors, in a one-sided first half, clinically dissected a comatose Sihlangu as if they were a lab rat during a biology tutorial. Professor Ovidy Karuru, the leading COSAFA Castle 2017 goal scorer with six goals, conducted the operation.
As I peck this laptop keyboard in the ungodly hours of Monday morning at the plush Royal Marang Five Star Hotel, which was home to the Three Lions (England’s national Football team - David Beckham & Co.) during the 2010 World Cup, I have come to the conclusion that Swazi football is like marrying the perfect girl, only to find out she is the devil’s little sister!

As we survey the wreckage of yet another international football tragedy, we have to accept that perhaps we have been too ahead of ourselves and maybe, we are not the world beaters we thought we have become. We have been confronted by a sobering reality that we are lacking the tactically and technical nuance needed at the highest level of the game. We may, at times, punch above our weight but as long as our government does not give football the serious financial backing it deserves and as long as we embark on short-cuts for development programmes we will always come short; we will always end up with the wooden part of the spoon.

Granted I have travelled with Swallows in many of their African safari where they stood their ground against more illustrious opposition but in terms of tactical approach, with all due respect, it has been chalk and cheese; oil and water; fire and ice. Short-cuts, unfortunately, in this game of the billions, do not work at times no matter how much money you can pour into the game. Look at Mzansi football. Our neighbours, South Africa, have repeatedly failed to translate their big bosses tsunami of promises about development into visible action. The Premier Soccer League (PSL) rated the 10th best league in the world standard is shockingly low, but until clubs are compelled to scout and coach youngsters from the age of eight upwards and concentrate them in elite youth leagues, a South African football renaissance will remain a fantasy.

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