South Africa’s
National Coach Bows Out
Tony Ekata, Johannesburg
Joel
Santana, Coach of South Africa’s national soccer team, Bafana
Bafana has vacated his job following growing calls for his
resignation.
The Chief Executive Officer of the South Africa Football
Association (SAFA), Raymond Hack, told newsmen on Monday that
the decision for the Brazilian coach to step down was reached
amicably.
Hack said his two local assistants would take charge of the
national team until a substantive replacement was found.
Santana got the one-point-four-million rand (about two hundred
thousand US dollars) a month job in April 2008 on the
recommendation of his friend and countryman, Brazilian Carlos
Alberto Pereira, who was compelled to relinquish the position to
return home to be with his wife who was sick at the time.
Score card
Then, Bafana Bafana were hoping to qualify for the 2010 African
Nations Cup in Angola and Santana was expected to carry on where
Pereira left off in building a team for next year’s FIFA World
Cup in South Africa. Bafana Bafana lost fourteen matches out of
twenty-seven under Santana’s charge, managing to win ten and
draw three.
In
his first match in charge, Santana suffered a 2-0 defeat to
Nigeria and despite wins against Equatorial Guinea, failing to
beat Sierra Leone cost them a place at the 2010 African Nations
Cup to be hosted by Angola.
The Confederations Cup in June this year presented a momentary
relief when Bafana put up some commendable performances against
quality opposition, but took a turn for the worst soon
afterwards. They lost eight of their last nine matches.
In
a move to try and salvage the situation, the new SAFA executive
set up a task team comprising two former local coaches of the
national squad and one local premier league coach to assess the
team thus, piling more pressure on the Brazilian.
The final straw was a one-zero defeat to lowly-rated Iceland and
a drop to 85th on the world rankings - the lowest since 1994.
Yinka
