30 November 2024 – South African Football Association (SAFA) Chief Medical Officer Dr Thulani Ngwenya has been appointed by the Confederation of African Football (CAF) to oversee the Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) assessments that will be conducted on the players participating in the U-17 Africa Cup of Nations 2025 | COSAFA Qualifier in Johannesburg next month.
The tournament will be held in Johannesburg from 4 December – 13 December 2024 and Dr Ngwenya said the MRI assessments will be used to confirm the eligibility of all the players in the event. “This process is done to safeguard the game and to ensure that every player participating in the tournament is eligible to play in the CAF U-17 category,” he said.
Dr Ngwenya continued and said the eligibility is based on players born from 1 January 2008 and the tests will be used to ensure that they are within the required birth date range for the competition. The SAFA Chief Medical Officer has been constantly on the move this year after attending the Aspire Academy Global Summit in Qatar earlier this month.
The Summit discussed Sports Science conversation with other Global Football Associations and covered topics like “The evolution of Football performance & Science over the last decade; The technical-tactical (r)evolution of the last 10 years in world football & The future of football performance.
The Summit gave SAFA an opportunity to engage with other federations in the world and it also helped gauge where the Association is when it comes to the modern global trends of Football Science. “I hope to use the lessons learnt to help our national teams and football development to rise to even greater heights. Our biggest vision is to play major tournaments in the world, not only to participate but to really perform well so that we are a strong force to be reckoned with in the Global space,” the SAFA Chief Medical Officer said. “We have enormous potential and we are on the right track, and this Summit enhanced our prospects.”
Dr Ngwenya also attended a CAF Medical Committee Workshop in Addis Ababa last month where they discussed critical medical issues affecting African football. “There were very robust discussions, and we made resolutions on many issues that are going to take African Football to greater heights.”
South African Football: The team has participated in various international tournaments beyond AFCON and the World Cup.
Trick Baron
Albert Johanneson Made Country People Proud: Very few black players from South Africa have had the chance to represent the country at the top level of English football, but many are quite successful at small African football clubs such as the Garden Hotspurs. Gladly, he was the first black player to represent the country in this tournament and also in the FA Cup Final. He proved to be a gem for the country by giving an improbable performance in the contests!
Arsenic Coo
Rugby is also a very popular sport in South Africa and their national team, the Springboks, has performed particularly well in the international stage taking the 1995, 2007 and 2019 Rugby World Cups. There is also a fair amount of world-class Rugby players from South Africa that includes Bryan Habana, Danie Craven, Francois Pienaar, Frik du Preez, Joost van der Westhuizen, and Naas Botha. South Africa has also hosted quite a few international sports meetings like the 1996 African Cup of Nations, 2003 Cricket World Cup, as well as the 2007 World Twenty20 Championship.