The South Africa national soccer team, known as Bafana Bafana ("The Boys" in Zulu), represents South Africa in men's international soccer. The team is run by the South African Football Association (SAFA), the governing body for soccer in South Africa.
Bafana Bafana plays at various stadiums around the country. Having played their first match in 1906, South Africa returned to the world stage in 1992, after sixteen years of being banned from FIFA, and forty years of effective suspension due to the apartheid system.
South Africa: Road To FIFA 2026 World Cup | All Matches and Goals
Historical Overview
Football first arrived in South Africa through colonialism in the late nineteenth century, as the game was popular among British soldiers.
From the earliest days of the sport in South Africa until the end of apartheid, organised soccer was affected by the country's system of racial segregation.
In 1903 the SAFA re-affiliated with the English Football Association after the Second Boer War between the British Empire and the Boer state.
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There was a plan to play a tournament held in Argentina, with South Africa and Fulham as guest teams, but it was not carried out.
South Africa played a total of 12 matches in South America, winning 11 with 60 goals scored and only 7 conceded.
Opponents included Belgrano A.C., the Argentina national team, a combined Liga Rosarina, Estudiantes (BA) and Quilmes.
The only team that defeated South Africa was Argentina's Alumni 1-0 at Sociedad Sportiva stadium in Buenos Aires, on 24 June, although the South Africans would take revenge on 22 July, defeating them 2-0.
The players were exclusively white, civil servants, government employees, bankers and civil engineers.
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South Africa was one of four African nations to attend FIFA's 1953 congress, at which the four demanded, and won, representation on the FIFA executive committee.
Thus the four nations (South Africa, Ethiopia, Egypt and Sudan) founded the Confederation of African Football in 1956, and the South African representative, Fred Fell, sat at the first meeting as a founding member.
It soon became clear however that South Africa's constitution prohibited racially mixed teams from competitive sport, and so they could only send either an all-black side or an all-white side to the planned 1957 African Cup of Nations. At the second CAF conference in 1958, South Africa were formally expelled from CAF.
The all-white FASA were admitted to FIFA in the same year, but in August 1960 it was given an ultimatum of one year to fall in line with the non-discriminatory regulations of FIFA.
On 26 September 1961 at the annual FIFA conference, the South African association was formally suspended from FIFA.
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Sir Stanley Rous, president of The Football Association of England and a champion of South Africa's FIFA membership, was elected FIFA President a few days later.
Rous was adamant that sport, and FIFA in particular, should not embroil itself in political matters and against fierce opposition, he continued to resist attempts to expel South Africa from FIFA.
Rous declared that if the suspension were not lifted, soccer there would be discontinued, possibly to the point of no recovery.
The next annual conference of FIFA in October 1964 took place in Tokyo and was attended by a larger contingent of representatives from African and Asian associations and here the suspension of South Africa's membership was re-imposed.
Return to International Football
The team entered the 1994 Cup of Nations qualifiers and was placed in Group 5, along with Mauritius, Zambia and Zimbabwe.
They won one game, away to Mauritius, and drew with Mauritius and Zimbabwe at home.
For the 1994 FIFA World Cup qualifiers South Africa was placed in Group D, along with Congo, Libya and Nigeria. Libya withdrew from the qualifiers.
The shock firing of AFCON-winning coach Clive Barker did little to slow momentum as they followed their 1996 success with a second-place finish at the 1998 Africa Cup of Nations behind Egypt under Jomo Sono.
The team had earned their first appearance at the FIFA World Cup, qualifying for France '98.
Under newly hired coach Trott Moloto, South Africa started the decade off strongly, finishing third in the 2000 Africa Cup of Nations; despite this, another coaching change was made.
Portuguese Carlos Queiroz was hired as the man to take South Africa to the 2002 FIFA World Cup.
South Africa qualified for the 2002 AFCON and were eliminated in the quarter-finals against hosts Mali.
Former legend Jomo Sono was brought back in a caretaker capacity to lead South Africa in Korea/Japan.
Placed in Group B along with Spain, Paraguay and debutants Slovenia, South Africa earned a 2-2 draw against Paraguay in their opening game with a last-gasp penalty from Quinton Fortune and followed that up with their first-ever victory at the finals with a 1-0 win over Slovenia.
South Africa headed into their final game against Spain second in the group and three points clear of Paraguay and Slovenia.
South Africa would go through 4 head coaches between the 2002 and 2006 FIFA World Cups: Ephraim Mashaba (2002-2004), April Phumo (2004), Stuart Baxter (2004-2005), Ted Dumitru (2005-2006) and caretaker Pitso Mosimane (2006).
None of them were able to match the success seen in the late 1990s and early 2000s, as South Africa failed to progress beyond the group stages in either the 2004 or 2006 Africa Cups of Nations, failing to register a single goal in the latter, with South Africa failing to qualify for the World Cup.
Former World Cup winner and Brazil national team coach Carlos Alberto Parreira was approached for the job, and he accepted.
He signed a R100 million contract covering four years. His term as manager started 1 January 2007 targeting the 2010 FIFA World Cup, which South Africa had been awarded the right to host.
He resigned as coach in April 2008 due to family reasons. The World Cup hosts failed to qualify for the 2010 Africa Cup of Nations, and Parreira would return in time for the 2009 FIFA Confederations Cup - also hosted by South Africa.
The national team would see an improvement in performance, holding its own against eventual world champions Spain and perennial powerhouse Brazil, the latter requiring an 88th-minute goal to overcome South Africa in the semi-finals.
2010 FIFA World Cup
As World Cup hosts, South Africa was placed in Group A, along with Mexico, Uruguay and 2006 runners-up France.
South Africa played the first game, which opened the World Cup 2010 tournament with a 1-1 draw against Mexico after taking the lead through a long-range Siphiwe Tshabalala strike.
A heavy 3-0 defeat in the second group game against Uruguay and a Mexican win over France left South Africa with a mountain to climb in order to progress beyond the group stage.
Following the conclusion of the World Cup and the expiration of his contract, Carlos Alberto Parreira announced his retirement from coaching.
Post-2010 Performance
South Africa failed to qualify for the Africa Cup of Nations finals after the rules were misread.
They ultimately played for and achieved a draw at home in Nelspruit against Sierra Leone in a game they needed to win, when news about Niger trailing in Egypt was received, leading to the qualification of Niger at their expense, and also at Sierra Leone's.
South Africa continued to disappoint into 2012, opening the year with a lacklustre 0-0 draw away to 2012 Africa Cup of Nations co-hosts Equatorial Guinea.
This would be the start of a run that would see Bafana Bafana rack up 6 successive draws to start the year.
The run of draws included 1-1, 0-0 and 1-1 draws at home to African champions Zambia, Ghana and Senegal respectively in International Friendlies.
Following a 1-1 draw at home to Ethiopia in a 2014 World Cup qualifier, head coach Pitso Mosimane was fired.
The draw increased South Africa's streak to 7 games without a win. In his first game in charge as interim head coach, Komphela oversaw yet another uninspired performance in South Africa's second World Cup qualifier against Botswana as they drew yet again, extending their winless run to 8 games.
Following the crisis in Libya throughout 2011, CAF made the decision to move the 2013 Africa Cup of Nations from Libya - who were the original hosts - to South Africa.
They received a First round bye when the qualifying process for the 2014 FIFA World Cup began on 30 July 2011.
For the second round of the qualifying process, South Africa was placed in Pot 1 as a top-seeded nation for the draw from where they were drawn into Group A, along with neighbours Botswana, the Central African Republic and Ethiopia.
South Africa were eliminated in the group stage at the 2015 AFCON and failed to qualify for the tournament two years later. Under Molefi Ntseki, South Africa failed to qualify for the 2021 Africa Cup of Nations.
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