Sport - THE former president of the Durban and Districts Football Association, Azaad Rahim, has lived football for almost all his life and even had a few punches thrown his way for good measure.
The 62-year-old from Asherville, Overport, says the youth and young men were hungry to hone their skills and compete at club level but times had changed.
“Back then inter-schools and district matches were the rage. But football now has gone backward,” said Rahim, who retired as the association’s president in 2007.
“The sport needs to be revived and the standards improved. I had some good years but soccer is no longer about the passion. It’s about the money. It needs discipline from the amateur ranks.”
Rahim started out playing school soccer at Springfield Hindu Primary and later at Claire Hills High, while dabbling as a defender for the locally run Liverpool Football Club.
After high school, he was tired of the humdrum of running around the pitch and at 18 started his own team, Alpine Athletics FC, in Alpine Road, Springfield.
“The club I previously played for, Asters, could not accommodate having more than one senior team, so I started my own club and asked other players I had known over the years to join.
“They came from Asherville, Springtown and Clare Estate and some others, who lived at the ML Sultan residence, were from Stanger. It took a lot of hard work overseeing a team and hosting fund raisers to buy our sports kits.”
He said Alpine Athletics FC had won an Open Cup final by defeating Savells FC 2-1.
Rahim later moved on to Roslyn FC, where he became manager. “We lost in the semi-final of the Clover Cup in the mid-80s to Croftedene Crusaders of Chatsworth,” he said, before adding that he relocated, yet again, to Westmore Park FC in Springtown as its manager.
“We won the district league in the late 1980s and the team was promoted to the Southern Natal Football Association, which was a provincial structure.”
He joined the Asherville Football Association as a referee, record clerk, and public relations officer.
“We worked for the love of the game and were not paid a dime.” That love took on a whole new meaning when a match played out between two Asherville teams.
He does not recall the opposition’s name but the incident remains crystal clear.
“I gave a decision that the one team was unhappy with. Their supporters flooded the field, three of them begam assaulting me. Players and spectators intervened.”
With a few bruises to show, Rahim said the match continued with him in the referee jersey. He served as a referee for about a decade, later proceeding to Durban and Districts when it formed in 1992. Rahim was also a registrar and became president in 1995, overseeing the administration until 2007.
Football remained his passion, and a year later he started the Durban Sports Academy for junior and senior players. But in 2012 he became ill and it closed.
The grandfather of four is a Liverpool fan. His favourite player was John Barnes.