Safa blasts SABC over delayed Afcon match

The South African Football Association has hit out at the SABC for not providing live television coverage of Bafana Bafana’s 2019 Africa Cup of Nations qualifying victory over Nigeria on June 10.

The SABC only showed the game two hours after kick-off, meaning millions of viewers missed out on seeing the match live. It was only broadcast live in South Africa by pay-to-view broadcaster SuperSport.

“We are not happy that the SABC saw fit not to take Bafana live,” said Safa CEO Dennis Mumble yesterday.

“There is no sports team in the country with as big a following as Bafana and for the SABC to do something like this is really not acceptable. But we do also understand the (financial) challenges the SABC are facing right now.”

As the Nigeria game was away, the SABC would have had to purchase the rights to show it live.

“What I heard, not directly from them, is that they could not afford it,” added Mumble.

SABC spokesman Kaizer Kganyago, however, yesterday denied money was the reason the channel did not show the game live.

“It was a scheduling issue,” said Kganyago.

“The game was played two hours before the scheduled time for our sports. Matches on a Saturday are usually at 8pm. We were told a bit late about the kickoff and we could not reschedule. It had nothing to do with money.”

Safa president Danny Jordaan (left) gave a presentation yesterday at Safa House, meanwhile, in which he painted a picture of an organisation in rude health.

According to figures released by Jordaan, Safa are anticipating a profit for the financial year of 2017 of R33.7 million, including R10 million from the SABC, R8 million from the Fifa Legacy Trust, R11.7 million from the Confederation of African Football and R4 million from South African Breweries.