Two legends give their views
Footballers and golf tend to go together like cheese and wine and it was no different at the Gary Player Invitational at Sun City this weekend as legends of the local and international game came to support this charity event.
Teeing up at the tournament were former Bafana players Mark Fish and Matthew Booth, as well as former Liverpool and England striker Robbie Fowler and Dutch midfield maestro and former Chelsea coach Ruud Gullit.
It was interesting to hear the different on-course attitudes of the players, with Fish about as laid-back as can be about his own golfing endeavours.
“I am pretty relaxed about it,” he said.
“Playing as a footballer, I was a striker who became a defender, Jomo (Sono) moved me to play as a defender and what it taught me was not to take sport too seriously. If we lose we lose, as long as I give 100%.
“I am a very relaxed golfer, I enjoy playing, but if I hit a bad shot it is not my profession, I am not going to throw my golf clubs and swear.”
Gullit, on the other hand, was serious enough about his game that after playing in the pro-am event on Friday he went to the driving range for an hour before coming in for his media duties.
The Dutch legend, who won the 1988 European Championships with the Netherlands, said he found golf generally far more nerve-wracking than the football field.
“It is terrible,” Gullit said. “It is like walking from the middle of the pitch to take a penalty, the walk of shame. The whole nation is behind you and if you miss you are dead. It is a bit the same in golf, you get penalised for everything you do wrong. But for me to play golf now is good, you don’t need to run and you can play with old people and young people, male and female.”
Both the Netherlands and South Africa have endured disappointment this year, with their national teams failing to make it to the 2018 Fifa World Cup finals in Russia next year.
Fish, who won the 1996 Africa Cup of Nations with Bafana in 1996, is forthright in his criticism of the national team structures.
“In world football since 1992 we have had more than 20 Bafana coaches, the last World Cup we qualified for was 2002, we are just going backwards or not going anywhere. We must have had over 400 players since 1992 as well but 80% of our administrators are still the same …. so you tell me what you think is wrong. I push for Lucas Radebe to be Safa president.
“There is the technical side and the administrative side, I don’t think Lucas can do that (administration), but from putting out a cleaner, more presentable face of Safa, where people might look at Safa differently … I don’t see why Safa haven’t used more former players I think it is arrogance. We need to get more players involved, whether it is on the coaching or technical side.”
Gullit is more philosophical about the problems facing the Dutch, who failed to qualify for Euro 2016 as well as Russia 2018.
“I don’t think something is wrong, we are a small nation and we were at the highest level for a long time. When I started playing for them we missed two tournaments, one because Spain had to beat Malta by 11 goals (Euro ’84 qualifying, Spain won 12-1) … then two years later we didn’t make it (to the 1986 World Cup) because of a goal given minutes before fulltime by Belgium. It goes in waves, we had a couple of really strong generations after that and now we are coming back again.”