Despite soccer being South Africa’s most popular sport, Bafana Bafana struggles to garner the same level of support as the Springboks and Proteas, possibly due to decades of mediocrity despite low ticket prices, even for international matches. Picture: BackpagePix
Image: BackpagePix
Soccer is the most popular sport in South Africa, yet Bafana Bafana seems to be the least well-supported side of the big three sports in the country.
Backing the Springboks is both an institution and almost a religion in the Rainbow Nation. Their four Rugby World Cup titles and countless other trophies make supporting them an easy sell.
For the Proteas, it’s a bit more tricky as they are yet to achieve World Cup success in limited overs. They, of course, won the World Test Championship in 2025, and even when they disappoint in big events like the T20 World Cup where they crashed out at the quarter-final stage earlier this month, they were the talk of the town before and after that match.
Bafana certainly have the ability to grab headlines, especially when they underperform like they did at the Africa Cup of Nations earlier this year, but it’s a fact that when they play at home, they often battle to get in big crowds to their matches.
That’s in stark contrast to Kaizer Chiefs and Orlando Pirates, who will always fill a stadium in just about every Soweto Derby.
Maybe it’s down to ticket prices then, right? Wrong. Tickets for Springbok games are normally at least R1,000, way if they are able to purchase early. Tickets for a Proteas game are generally several hundred rand at least.
Bafana are taking on Panama at Moses Mabhida Stadium, in Durban, in an international friendly on Friday night, with the second match taking place four days later in Cape Town. The prices for Friday’s clash? R80 for adults and R50 for kids. If the crowd is more than 10,000 on Friday, I will be surprised.
Even in a Fifa World Cup year, people just don’t flock to see Bafana. It’s one thing to do a whole lot of grandstanding on social media, but people simply don’t come out in their numbers to see the national soccer team.
Why that is is difficult to explain. Perhaps it’s down to the decades of mediocrity that Bafana have produced. After all, the last time they actually qualified for a Fifa World Cup was in the 2002 edition (they gained automatic entry as hosts in 2010).
Even if Bafana were to pull off a massive shock at the Fifa World Cup starting in June and progress beyond the group stage, it’s still unlikely they will command major support back home like anything in the same ballpark as the Springboks or Proteas.
And that’s a shame.