Fondest farewell to Don Mudaly

MARLAN PADAYACHEE

The death this week of an ailing Durban-based manager of one of the city’s top professional football teams, Berea FC, has stoked nostalgia and déjà vu of the halcyon days of the push to play non-racial sports under the shadowy yoke of apartheid, among dozens of former officials, players and fan following on social media.

Born Ferdinand Donavan Mudaly of Asherville, he finally lost the last match of his seven decades of life and times on Monday, aged 78.

Droves of mourners are expected to file past his coffin at the St Anthony’s Catholic Church on Tuesday, a stone’s throw away from the landmark Currie’s Fountain Stadium where Mudaly excelled as the manager of glamour club, Berea, from the 1970s to 1980s.

Mudaly was a prominent personality in the Federation Professional Soccer League. He had witnessed the intense rivalry between the FPL and the whites-only National Football League but realised his dream of recruiting some of the finest white footballers from New Kingsmead, as well as working alongside coach Ivan Saunders, a former Durban United player.

Regarded as one of the shrewdest managers in the history of non-racial football, Mudaly had the knack of scouting for talented young players and leading ball players during his reign as a successful team boss.

Businessman Daddy Reddy gave him the biggest break of his career in football management and appointed him to Berea FC. He spent a decade at Berea and 12 years at the city’s leading team, Manning Rangers. The Mighty Maulers under coach Gordon Igesund became the inaugural winners of the newly launched Professional Soccer League (PSL), pipping giants, Kaizer Chiefs, Orlando Pirates, Sundowns and other teams.

His glory years were sketched in 1975 and 1976 when he steered Berea to dramatic comeback cup finals against Sundowns and Cape Town Spurs, winning 4-3 after being down 3-1, plus picking up the FPL League Cup. He joined rivals Manning Rangers, from 1985-1992, pipping Bluebells United one-nil for the Osman’s Spice Cup. By the 1990s, the merger between the FPL and its parent body, SASF, with black and white football associations, a historic deal brokered by exiled ANC leader Steve Tshwete and Durban-born former soccer and swimming coach, Sam Ramsamy, also exiled in London as head of the SA National Olympic Committee (Sanroc) and National Sports Congress mediator Krish Naidoo in Gaborone, Botswana in 1989, opened doors for Mudaly and other local officials to team up as salaried managers at the new SA Football Association. Some of his highlights included becoming the general manager of the SA Football Association KZN, his employers from 1994 to 1997, and a freelance sports good sales job, skills he acquired at Carnation Milk.

From New Zealand, former striker, Dudu Naidoo quipped: “Don Mudaly was one of the finest managers with Berea and a real deal-maker who knew how to lure the top players and pay them handsomely. Once after a night of partying, he offered me and my brother Ramoo Naidoo a few hundred extra to play and we scored the winning goals.”

Paul Bishop of Wentworth was a star defender at rivals Verulam Suburbs, who played alongside the most skilful ball players, Preston Julius and Errol Burrie Martin.

He recalled how Mudaly would knock on his door for several weeks at 10pm – probably after Berea’s coaching sessions – and plead with him to move to Berea.

Bishop was unmoved, until his wife, irritated by Mudaly’s quiet persistence, pleaded with her husband to sign up and end the nightly visits.

Hard-tackling Bishop fitted into the star-studded team like a glove, alongside leading footballers.

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