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South Africa want to spread World Cup fever

JOHANNESBURG — South Africa hope to build on the World Cup fever that enveloped the country a few months ago when the 2010/2011 Premiership season kicks off Friday.

The 240-match schedule stretches to late May and starts with a floodlit Cape Town Stadium double-header that pits promoted local club Vasco da Gama against star-studded Orlando Pirates before Ajax Cape Town face Bloemfontein Celtic.

A 68,000-seater during the world spectacle, the capacity of a stadium that offers Table Mountain as a majestic backdrop has been trimmed to just over 50,000 amid hope that two fixtures can come close to creating a ‘full house’.

Premier Soccer League officials are desperate to woo back to grounds around the country the white, mixed race and Asian-origin football fans who packed them in June and July.

Fears that many World Cup fixtures would be staged before poor crowds proved unfounded as locals turned up in droves despite comparitively steep ticket prices, some traffic chaos and freezing weather for many night games.

There were more white faces than usual when South Africa hosted World Cup quarter-finalists Ghana in a friendly on a cold midweek Johannesburg night this month and this offered hope of racially mixed football crowds.

Blacks traditionally support football while other race groups prefer rugby union or cricket with the Springboks luring a near-90,000 crowd to Soccer City last weekend despite losing their previous three games.

A catch is that while the World Cup offered stars like Spaniard David Villa, Arjen Robben of the Netherlands, German Thomas Muller and Diego Forlan of Uruguay, the Premiership is desperately short of crowd-pullers.

When South Africa returned to international football in 1992 after decades in an apartheid-induced wilderness, offensive midfielders ‘Doctor’ Khumalo and ‘Shoes’ Moshoeu were fan magnets.

Years in a vacuum meant South Africa had a unique brand of football. It was light years behind the rest of the world but supporters could not get enough of the ‘showboating’ as skilful individual tricks came long before teamwork.

Khumalo now assesses Premiership games for pay channel SuperSport while Moshoeu coaches and local football is poorer for their parting with even ‘big guns’ Kaizer Chiefs and Orlando Pirates not always drawing sell-out crowds.

Some local football offerings come from the top drawer, some are good and some average, but too many are mediocre with crowds of just a few thousand watching in a morgue-like atmosphere that further dilutes the attraction.

Although chasing an unprecedented fourth consecutive league title, well coached and highly organised SuperSport United do not have a star fans will travel a hundred kilometres to watch.

Pretoria neighbours Mamelodi Sundowns boast leading national team scorer Katlego Mphela with numerous reports that he was bound for Birmingham City or Glasgow Rangers not materialising as the transfer-window deadline looms.

Wide Chiefs midfielder Siphiwe Tshabalala sprang to worldwide prominence when he scored a superb opening World Cup goal against Mexico and with a proposed move to Turkey off, has a chance to build his image.

Another wide, attacking midfielder, Teko Modise of Pirates, has not matched expectations of stardom and ended the World Cup as a substitute, leaving coach and former Dutch star Ruud Krol with a major challenge.

Most critics believe the champions will come from SuperSport, Sundowns, Chiefs or Pirates, that the middle of the table will be congested as usual, and that Vasco will do well to avoid making a swift return to second-tier football.