Bafana may hand Ethiopians a nasty surprise 

SUCH was the tension in the bowels of the Royal Bafokeng Stadium on that chilly evening in June 2012 that you could have cut the air with a knife.
Bafana Bafana had stuttered to a costly 1-1 home draw with Ethiopia in a 2014 Soccer World Cup qualifier and the South African Football Association (Safa) high-ranking national executive committee members in attendance shook their heads in disgust when the referee signalled the final whistle.
A very reliable little birdie — and this birdie is so unbelievably dependable that I’d gamble the entire contents of my piggy bank on its predictions — told me that coach Pitso Mosimane’s employers at Safa were not amused and it would be in his best interests to refresh the old CV as his days were numbered.
But Mosimane didn’t strike me as a man who knew he was standing below a noose when he addressed the media in a post-match press briefing after the little birdie had whispered its sweet nothings. So the match report of that Bafana match against Ethiopia was overtaken by off-the-field developments after the final whistle and I broke the story of Mosimane’s pending sacking the next day.
Safa officially fired Mosimane’s days later and the Ethiopian national team had in some way contributed towards the sacking of a Bafana coach.
Now, you may well wonder just where exactly am I going with this behind-the-scenes glimpse of life in a coaching seat, a seat that forever has a bonfire blazing beneath it, even in the best of times.
Well, Bafana face the selfsame Ethiopians in the return fixture in Addis Ababa this weekend and the question in our minds is whether they are cocky enough to believe that they can seamlessly pick up where they left off in Rustenburg exactly a year ago.
If you thought this past Saturday’s qualifier against the Central African Republic (CAR) was crucial — which Bafana won 3-0 in Yaounde, thank you — then think again.
Sunday’s decisive World Cup qualifier against Ethiopia in Addis Ababa is much more serious than life and death, to borrow loosely from former Liverpool manager Bill Shankly.
Despite their heroics against CAR in Yaounde, Bafana remain second on the group A qualifying table and they trail leaders Ethiopia by two points. In fact, we now understand why the Ethiopian coach Sewnet Bishaw was practically delirious after the point they picked up at the Royal Bafokeng Stadium.
"It was a mistake they (Bafana) scored in the first place," he said at the time. "We never gave Bafana any space but this draw is still nice for us."
But then again, Bafana are hardly the team they were under Mosimane a year ago and the Ethiopians are in for a nasty surprise if they believe that.
Bafana coach Gordon Igesund has turned the team around in the intervening months and they are starting to approach the form that made South Africa one of the most respected national teams on the continent.
While that 3-0 win in Yaounde was refreshing, a win in Addis Ababa would no doubt send long-suffering football followers of this country into a frenzy like no other.
But Safa, Igesund and Bafana have to remember to read with caution, especially when there is so much at stake.
The gamesmanship and underhand tactics that greet South African football teams when they travel to other parts of this continent have reached shameful proportions and we’d be naive to expect a red carpet to be rolled out to Bafana when they land in Ethiopia.
The reality is that a victory would put Bafana in control of their own destiny in this penultimate round of the World Cup qualifiers and South Africa would not need favours from anyone when the final fixtures of this leg of the qualifying matches for the showpiece are played in September.
While qualifying for the 2014 Soccer World Cup remains the ultimate goal for the national team, the reality is that Igesund would also put himself firmly in the pound seat with a prized away victory in Ethiopia and he would even silence those cynics that the little birdie was telling me about.