Former Super Eagles midfielder, Waidi Akanni has lambasted South African Sports Minister, Fikile Mbalula, for making unpleasant statement against the country’s national team after their ouster from the 2014 African Nations Championship, (CHAN).
South Africa, after their impressive start against Mozambique and a draw against Mali, Bafana Bafana scandalously lost 1-3 to Nigeria and crashed out of the tournament.
The country’s Sports Minister could not control his emotion as he quickly went to the press to vent his anger on Bafana Bafana.
Mbalula called Bafana Bafana bad names as he labelled them a bunch of ‘useless players’, thus insisting that the team problem wasn’t from the coaching. Reacting to it, Akanni said the statement was too hash on the players and they deserve to be praised, instead of the counter accusations from the Minister.
“I don’t think it’s proper. Football needs support even when you lose. There is always another chance for the players and the Minister shouldn’t have taken it personal. In sports, you win some, you lose some. You cannot always be a winner. Nigeria has Goodluck Jonathan as our president, he has never reacted in such manner when a game is lost. It does not show good spirit of sportsmanship when a game is lost and the heads are casted though it happens sometime,”he said.
Akanni said as a former player, he would work very hard to prove the Minister wrong next time. The players should know that the man was just trying to save his job by speaking the minds of the government but he got it wrong.
“If a team loses that is not the end of the world. It may take time, but they need to do extra work to bounce back. They need to go back to the drawing board and make the best of their findings. There is time for everything. The Minister need to be a true sportsman,” Akanni said.
After Bafana Bafana early exit from CHAN, South African Football Association,(SAFA) president, Danny Jordaan, promised to transform the country’s football by renaming the national team and employing new technical staff and by securing a new technical sponsor. According to him, it was not a witch hunt because Bafana Bafana lost to Nigeria in the CHAN tournament but part of a process he began when he was elected to the presidency late last year.
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