By Daniel Chokoe
I remember growing up we played a lot of football, having a proper ball to play with was a priviledge. The ball would usually be owned by one of the boys from the rich families, I was also the unfortunate one because although I was brought up in a middle class family they used to buy me football merchandise because I was talented.
“Cheese boy”,a name used to refer to a boy from a rich family would have the football merchandise but no talent whatsoever; so whenever we needed to play a game we would start by playing in the first game then substitute him in the games that follow. We made an exception to include him in our game because we needed his merchandise to play, we let him play the first game to remind him how untalented he is after the poor performers he would then sit and watch the rest of the games as talented players showcase their skills.
Sadly, the exact thing is happening to Bafana Bafana, because they have the best facilities in the continent they get to host tournaments and automatically qualify to play as hosts. When the tournaments are reaching the climax stages the bow out, and watch other nations as they claim glory on their own turf. After every tournament they go back to the drawing board, I am starting to ask myself just how many drawing boards have been used by our national team. Sports Minister Fikile Mbalula has labelled them “useless individuals” as they were inhilated by a weak and inexperienced Nigerian side to be knocked out of the CHAN tournament. I think the question we should start asking ourself as a nation is : Do we have enough talent to compete with other nations or are we just cheese boys with no talent?
Diski Express 