On the Ball

Simba Marumo speaks his mind, all the PSL winners, and find out what Gary McNab is up to these days

RETIRED South African footballer Simba Marumo believes the lack of consistency in the Premier Soccer League and Bafana Bafana is down to players being too apologetic for their excellence. An alarming issue with some of South Africa’s brightest footballing prospects over the past years has been their lack of consistency, and failure to step up when needed most. Players such as Jabu Pule and Junior Khanye immediately come to mind, and more recently players like Kermit Erasmus, who was tipped to become one of the South Africa’s ‘next big things’ after shining at the 2009 Fifa Under-20 World Cup in Egypt. “I think it boils down to the fact that we, as South Africans, have a fundamental problem: we apologise for excellence; we apologise for being great; we want to dim our light because ‘I don’t want to make people uncomfortable or make out that I’m too good’,” says Marumo. “Also, when you do have someone who’s actually good, other guys will then try to pull him down, make him feel bad and pass funny remarks and so on. Instead of being inspired by excellence we hate it, and when you are excellent or have that potential then you want to dim yourself for fear of making others uncomfortable.” The Safpu president adds that this is something unique to South Africans, which explains why Europeans, South Americans and even other Africans tend to dominate in world football. “When you go to other countries guys don’t apologise, they don’t care! They feel ‘If you want to be mediocre or less than what you are, that’s your problem’, and they are willing to go full-steam ahead [towards becoming great],” the former Platinum Stars striker says. “We must start instilling tilling that mentality [that players need to be unapologetically great] ... I don’t know how long it’s going to take because it’s something that we’ve grown up with over the years, and it’s generational, so it will take a couple of years to undo that. But someone needs to start and push to be the best.”