Boks, Bafana face crunch

THE senior national soccer and rugby teams play very important games today. Bafana Bafana are involved in a do-or-die World Cup qualifier against Burkina Faso at the FNB Stadium in Johannesburg, while the Springboks will be playing for pride against the All Blacks at Newlands Stadium in Cape Town.

For Stuart Baxter’s men to keep their fast-fading chances of making it to Russia next year, they will have to get the better of the tough West Africans.

A loss for bottom of Group D Bafana will effectively mean they will have to win all their remaining games – and hope that other results go their way.

Although Baxter has remained optimistic they can still qualify for next year’s World Cup, the reality is that the overrated Bafana are again on the verge of not qualifying for yet another major tournament. Most fans have already accepted they will have to adopt another team to support in Russia.

This has been evidenced by the poor sale of tickets for today’s game at FNB Stadium.

As a result of only 300 tickets being sold earlier this week, EFF commander-in-chief Julius Malema promised yesterday to give away 1 000 free tickets to pupils and fans in a bid to ensure the 94 736 capacity stadium will not be completely empty. The SA Football Association will likely also give away complimentary tickets to get fans in to the stadium.

At a sold-out Newlands, the Springboks will have a second go at the All Blacks in their final Rugby Championship game.

They go into the game with the morale-crushing and record 57-0 humiliating loss they suffered at the hands of the New Zealanders still at the back of their minds.

Boks coach Allister Coetzee has already conceded that anyone thinking his charges will demolish the All Blacks in Cape Town is “living in a fool’s paradise”.

That was a fair and honest assessment as the dominant All Blacks are, quite frankly, way better than South Africa at present.

But today’s clash will be a chance for the Boks to redeem themselves by putting up a better fight – and possibly even win. The fact that Newlands will probably be dominated by All Blacks supporters will not help the Boks’ quest – but anything is possible.

As Coetzee has previously said, it would be very unfair to judge him based on the outcome of one game.

But another huge defeat for the Boks will put more pressure on the Grahamstown-born Coetzee.

We can only hope that both the Boks and Bafana will get the desired results.