South Africa

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Founded: Friday, 01st January 1892

History: The South Africa national football team or Bafana Bafana (The Boys)[1], is the national team of South Africa and is controlled by the South African Football Association. It returned to the world stage in 1992, after years of being banned from FIFA. From the earliest days of the sport in South Africa until the end of apartheid, football in South Africa was affected by the country`s system of racial segregation. The all-white Football Association of South Africa (FASA), was formed in 1892, while the South African Indian Football Association (SAIFA), the South African Bantu Football Association (SABFA) and the South African Coloured Football Association (SACFA) were founded in 1903, 1933 and 1936 respectively. South Africa were invited to join Ethiopia, Egypt and Sudan at the first conference of the Confederation of African Football in Khartoum in 1957 and the South African representative, Fred Fell, sat at the first meeting as a founding member. It soon became clear however that South Africa`s constitution prohibited racially mixed teams from competitive sport and so they could only send either an all-black side or an all-white side to the planned 1957 African Cup of Nations. This was unacceptable to the other members of the Confederation and South Africa were disqualified from the competition, however some sources say that they withdrew voluntarily. At the second CAF conference in 1958 South Africa were formally expelled from CAF. The all-white (FASA) were admitted to FIFA in the same year, but in August 1960 it was given an ultimatum of one year to fall in line with the non-discriminatory regulations of FIFA. On 26 September 1961 at the annual FIFA conference, the South African association was formally suspended from FIFA. Sir Stanley Rous, president of The Football Association of England and a champion of South Africa`s FIFA membership, was elected FIFA President a few days later. Rous was adamant that sport, and FIFA in particular, should not embroil itself in political matters and against fierce opposition he continued to resist attempts to expel South Africa from FIFA. The suspension was lifted in January 1963 after a visit to South Africa by Rous in order to investigate the state of football in the country. Rous declared that if the suspension were not lifted, football there would be discontinued, possibly to the point of no recovery. The next annual conference of FIFA in October 1964 took place in Tokyo and was attended by a larger contingent of representatives from African and Asian associations and here the suspension of South Africa`s membership was re-imposed. In 1976, after the Soweto uprising, they were formally expelled from FIFA.