If you are looking for a scapegoat for what now appears to be a failed campaign by Bafana Bafana to qualify for the 2017 Africa Cup of Nations, then blame the Premier Soccer League, lack of development at a grassroots level and - as strange as it sounds - Neil Tovey, the SA Football Association (Safa) technical director.
What about Shakes Mashaba?
Well, the national team coach would like to be exonerated from any wrongdoing despite being defiant in his selection criteria three weeks ago ahead of the two back-to-back qualifiers against Cameroon this month.
Bafana could only manage draws, a gutsy 2-2 stalemate away in Limbe and a goalless encounter in Durban on Tuesday night, which all but ended any hopes of booking a ticket to the Afcon in Gabon.
“Blame the team,” was Mashaba’s first response when asked who should take responsibility for Bafana’s winless run in four qualifiers so far. But with the question asked again, the 65-year-old let rip on who should really fall on their sword following a dismal attempt - Bafana are five points adrift of group leaders Cameroon with two matches remaining - to get to Africa’s premier competition.
“It is most unfortunate that when the national team didn’t win, the blame comes to the coach.
“The problem of scoring goals doesn’t start here. Almost all the coaches in the PSL - and you will hear them after not winning a game - will tell you that scoring goals is always haunting them,” Mashaba said.
“Those are the things we cannot address in the senior national team. We’ve got only three days at the most. And if you look at what you do in a training session, you are talking tactical work, defending and attacking, and then you have to work on set pieces.
“But before you can even finish, you are on the plane to go play a match. These things should also come from the grassroots level, where people are taught things to grow up with.”
Mashaba, who is in his third stint as a Bafana coach, has seen the rise and fall of South African football on the international stage. From readmission into the world stage in 1992, winning the Afcon four years later and hosting the 2010 World Cup, Mashaba has often played a role. But when again quizzed about where he thought it all went sideways, the national team coach claimed he did not have an opinion.
“Good question, but you are directing it to the wrong person” he argued. “There is a department at Safa, the office of the technical director (Tovey was appointed in that role in June last year) that needs to deal with it. I think if he could come one day, he might explain better than I would. That is why I don’t want to go into that debate.”
There was still one more burning question, which could dominate the agenda at a Safa national executive committee meeting on Saturday: Will Mashaba, unlikely to qualify the team for the Afcon with the odds heavily stacked against Bafana, keep his job?
“That’s a silly question,” an angry Mashaba replied. “I have never come to your place of work to ask about your contract and job security. I respect that.
“Some of these questions are practised. They come from somewhere. Allow coaches to do their jobs. I am a human being. I’ve got blood, family, kids and grandkids.
“Imagine when they listen to this nonsense that Shakes Must Fall! and they read about these things. We can’t talk about the end of the road because we still have six points to play for and hope we can get the two slots for finishing as the best runners-up.” - The Mercury