In the cell blocks, the men were ecstatic, but intense debates immediately began to take place about whether or not the prisoners should actually take up the authorities’ offer. Marcus Solomon, for one, wanted to exploit the opportunity they had been given, to make political capital out of it, and use it to try and improve the prison diet. In order to play football, the men would need more calories and energy – but should they wait until they were granted better food before playing, or should they play and then launch their campaign for a better diet?
To the men, it was obvious that their campaign to win the right to play outside matches was about much more than just the game of football itself. Having joined together to pursue the campaign and won this concession from the prison regime, they had recaptured a sense of self-determination, and they now realized that they could capitalize further on the situation, exploit their new right as a bargaining chip. Food was the first issue, and their initial debate was decided: they would take up their privilege and play, and campaign for better food later.
On a windy Saturday morning in December 1967 warders strode into Cell Block Four and chose two teams of prisoners at random from those who had volunteered to play. One side chose the name Rangers, the other Bucks, and they ran proudly on to the playing area that had been cleared next to the cell blocks. It had less grass than the township pitches the men had played on as free men and was treacherously bumpy. The prisoners had no kit or football boots, so they played in their prison uniforms and most were barefoot. One thing, however, had been taken care of: there was a small crowd of spectators gathered around the makeshift pitch. The guards had allowed a handful of other inmates out to watch the match.
From the opening whistle, it was obvious that the poor physical condition of most of the men was affecting the quality of the football being played, as was the length of time they had been prevented from playing a proper game. Three or four years of not having played with a real ball, or on a pitch that was not made of cement and enclosed by the walls of a shared prison cell, had taken its toll. The game was riddled with poor passes and badly timed tackles, and the men’s lack of match fitness and stamina were obvious. None of this mattered to the players or the gaggle of fans. For them, it was the most exciting event that had ever taken place on Robben Island.
The final result of this thirty-minute match is not recorded, but everyone who took part walked off a winner. They were the pioneers, and they returned to their cell blocks with cheers and applause ringing in their ears. Football on the island had begun.
Matches took place every Saturday – of course, the men’s enthusiasm and dedication endured, confounding the chief warder’s confident prediction that it wouldn’t last two weeks. The standard of play continued to be poor, but no one was poking fun at the players’ lack of stamina or skill – it seemed nothing short of a miracle that they were out there kicking a football at all – and morale among the inmates couldn’t have been higher. Spectators waved homemade banners and sang football chants, demonstrating not only their allegiance to their team but their own growing sense of identity and comradeship.
Though Sedick Isaacs had no real interest in the actual sport of football, he was as excited by what was happening out on the pitch as any of the sports-mad spectators. Rather than the quality of play or the results, he was interested in what being involved in the sport actually meant to the men, the difference it was making to their lives. Not only did they derive enjoyment from playing and watching the game, organizing the physical set-up of the matches tested their ingenuity. Goals were constructed from planks of wood and fishing nets washed up on the shores of the island. An inmate who had worked as a cobbler cut and moulded stud shapes into the soles of the car-tyre sandals. Physically, the men were pushing themselves, and making game plans and establishing a league system honed the prisoners’ organizational and negotiating skills.
The footballers knew they were rusty and not properly match fit. Despite the punishing labour they had to endure daily in the quarry, to improve, they had to train. The more talented took on the responsibility of lifting the standard of play by organizing clandestine coaching sessions in the cells. The one man everyone wanted to train them was Pro Malepe.
Already a handy player, Mark Shinners soon learned what a skilled coach Malepe was, and felt privileged to share a cell with him. Pro led gym exercises in the cell-block bathroom – not in the cell itself, because the players wanted to respect the space of others not involved in the games. To toughen the men up, Pro would start them off with thirty to forty minutes’ worth of running on the spot, squats, splits, toe touches, and press-ups. Then the players would work on specific footballing skills – dribbling, passing, shooting, and tackling – all within the restricted area of the cell blocks.
Even though they’d done a hard day’s labour in the quarry, no concessions were made. Pro would not put up with an unfit player. He would focus his attention on the men who were showing signs of fatigue and be really hard on them – ‘Jump higher! Run faster!’ He wanted to make a point: those who were struggling could always give more. Gradually, the men’s fitness – and the level of competition – grew.
Indres Naidoo acted as a referee in some of the early half-hour matches. Like Sedick, he saw what a huge morale booster playing football was for the men. He too resolved that, now the prisoners had won the right to play the game, they had to force home their advantage by giving it a more formal structure. It was time to seize the moment.
The players negotiated with the warders to let them stay out longer and longer to play and, as they gained more time on the pitch, they began to form bigger and more courageous plans. First, the men tried to take more control over their game by insisting that the teams were no longer randomly chosen according to cells by the warders. They wanted to select their own teams – and, more ambitiously, to form clubs and establish a competitive football league on the island. What was more, they intended to run their football association strictly according to FIFA rules. Plans were already in hand for the most knowledgeable footballers to give referees and match officials rigorous training.
The prisoners lived their lives in such proximity to each other, rules and structure were vital. Passions and tensions could run very high and were exacerbated by enforced intimacy and confinement. Without strict guidelines, everyday life in the cells could be volatile. For the political prisoners, forming a football league was a chance to organize themselves, to practise the skills they would one day need when they had won the right to run their own country – and, if they were going to do it, they were going to do it right. Four days after the inaugural match between Rangers and Bucks, representatives from various cell blocks met surreptitiously in the quarry to draw up their manifesto.
It was an auspicious day. The ground rules were set but, even more importantly, men from different political factions were working together. Before the concerted campaign to win the right to play football, members of the major political groups on the island had been pretty much segregated from each other. They had different work gangs in the quarry, held separate seminars, greeted one another with different phrases and hand signals, and rarely co-operated. This cross-factional meeting was an indication of how far they had already come.
The men established their guidelines. Each club was to elect its own president, secretary, and officials. Committees were formed to oversee the running of each club and of the association itself. Within these structures, some of South Africa’s future leaders would learn how to organize, negotiate with, and inspire the men around them.
These early meetings were not, of course, without their problems. They often became heated and hostile, with suspicions on either side that one political grouping or the other was attempting to wrest control of the association. Each of the seven clubs that were created – Rangers, Bucks, Hotspurs, Dynamos, Ditshitshidi, Black Eagles, and Gunners – were formed along party lines.
This changed quickly when an eighth club, Manong FC, captained by Tony Suze, was admitted to the association before the first season began. It was the first club to select players irrespective of party allegiance and did so in an open manner. On page five of