The office felt I was still too junior a reporter to be sent to either the 1998 or 2000 Africa Cup of Nations tournaments. But that didn’t stop me from getting involved.
We were champions going into the 1998 tournament, but Clive Barker was not there to lead us to our title defence, “The Dog” having been fired after the Confederation Cup in Saudi Arabia at the end of
1997. Enter Jomo Sono and a nation expected.
But then again, Bafana - as in 1996 - spoilt my birthday celebrations as they lost a Cosafa Cup match to Namibia on January 24, their last match before the Afcon in Burkina Faso.
Surely disaster waited, we all thought.
Well, disaster happened for us (the Argus Newspaper Group then), senior soccer writer Mohen Govender falling ill while at the tournament and thus leaving a young Mzimasi Mgebisa to cover the event.
Back then laptops, 3G and wi-fi were foreign concepts and I thus had to participate covering the tournament by typing out Mgebisa’s faxed copy.
Often, some of it was illegible, handwritten on paper as it was - but it was great as it felt I was a part of the team bringing the Afcon home to our readers.
You’ll already know that we didn’t retain the title, Bafana losing 2-0 to Egypt in the final. And you also will no doubt remember that tournament as the one that set Benni McCarthy en route to Bafana superstardom - the lad from Hanover Park top-scoring at the showpiece.
For me, though, that event served to illustrate that Bra J is a street-smart football genius. What other coach do you know would have left his team in the middle of a tournament to come back home to sort out personal business and then go back to lead them to the final?
It was in the opening match against Angola, though, that Sono illustrated his quick thinking that went on to serve Bafana brilliantly.
McCarthy, young and impressionable, allowed his emotions to get the better of him having been generally kicked by the Angolans and then lashed out at an opponent with an elbow to leave him writhing on the ground.
Bra J - aware of the looming sending off for the youngster, instructed Mark Fish and Lucas Radebe to block
the referee while he instructed McCarthy to run away from
the field and go back to the hotel.
And just like that, Benni avoided a sending off, returned for the second match against Namibia to score four goals in a revenge-gaining 4-1 hammering and went on to add three more goals to share the tournament’s golden boot with Egypt’s Hossam Hassan.
There was that stunning long-range goal by David Nyathi in the quarter-final against Morocco as well before we meekly capitulated to a Hassan brace within the quarter-hour in the final.
Ghana and Nigeria co-hosted the millennium edition and Trott Moloto took charge. Our victory over the Black Stars in the semi-final was the highlight before we came unstuck against the other hosts, the Super Eagles.
The sight of Tijani Babangida leaving Mark Fish for dead lingers.
Along with third place on the podium, Bafana again brought home the golden
boot - this time courtesy of Shaun Bartlett who scored five goals.
*Matshelane Mamabolo will be writing a daily notebook in the build-up to and during the Africa Cup of Nations set to take place in Gabon from next Saturday to February 5.