Africa’s fake World Cup camaraderie

It is a no brainer that Africa’s five representatives are, without any grain of doubt, barely crawling at the 2014 Fifa World Cup in Brazil, but that is beside the point.

But before theories are brought into the jigsaw puzzle, the first question should be why the struggles of Algeria, Cote d’Ivoire, Nigeria, Ghana and Cameroon who are on their way back to Yaounde, should in the first place, be aligned more to Africa than the particular national teams.

Two European teams, outgoing world champions Spain and media favourites England, had at the time of writing been shown the revolving exit door of the 32-member competition in Brazil.

The excuse is that Europe has produced many world champions hence the uninspiring displays are a mere blip at the football fiesta. But then Africa is not the only continent yet to produce a world king.

Asia is, despite massive football investments and attracting over the years world class players such as Nicolas Anelka, Diego Forlan and Didier Drogba, yet to produce a World Cup champion, but such outcries are never continental.

Yet scan through the world media you would hardly come across an article apportioning the struggles of a single national team such as Japan to Asia football. Antoinette Muller raises the same point while writing onwww.guardian.com.

“Africa is not a country but African football certainly is,” Muller added.

This rarely happens in other areas. We are African whenever there is a World Cup and tend to support each other. You rarely hear Europeans talk about being ‘European’ or teams carrying the ‘hopes of a continent’.

Zimbabwe columnist Robson Sharuko wonders why Africans should now feel closer to the continent’s five World Cup representatives when the same is not the case during club and national team matches across the continents.

“The African camaraderie should start when we play against each other here on the continent, but when these teams treat us like we animals, on the occasions we go to their countries to play these international matches, those who feel they have a right to withdraw their support appear to have a point,” Sharuko wrote in his weekly Sharuko on Saturday.

Indeed, if there is a continent where visiting teams receive hostile reception then it is in Africa.

Atusaye Nyondo was stoned during a Nations Cup qualifying match in Chad in 2011 and Malawi fans reciprocated by stoning the Sao’s bus as it left Kamuzu Stadium in 2012.

In the late 1990s, it took Army intervention to rescue Malawi players from mob justice at Addis Ababa National Stadium during a game against Ethiopia. So which camaraderie is Africa pretending about?

Yes, the success of Africa would compel Fifa to increase Africa’s quota for the World Cup finals, but that is another issue. Cameroon, Senegal and Ghana are the only African teams to have reached the World Cup quarter-finals. The reasons are many.

Muller attributes Africa’s struggles to usual shoddy preparations, luck and “one theory involves the allocation of places. As a continent, Africa has 48 countries competing to get to the finals but only five places available. Europe gets 13 places.”

Another reason is, as Cameroon captain Samuel Eto’o Fils noted, African football association’s failure to manage big name players who cannot stomach amateurish administration back home.

“The only problem in Africa is our leaders, who do not respect us. Until we are respected, other (continents) will never have any consideration for us,” the outgoing Chelsea forward Eto told www.cafonline.com, echoing his latest bonus fights with the Cameroon Football Association that had the Lions jetted in Brazil late.

Africa football might, after all theories, be its own worst enemy. The genuine unity must start in-house, lest the struggles continue.