Watching the underdog prevail is always heart warming. Even more so when the race is the blue ribbon event. This happened in the Olympics pool where South Africa won the Men’s 4 x 100m freestyle relay. All the talk before had been of Australia against the USA with maybe the Dutch coming in to spoil the party. But the South Africans had different ideas, not only winning but breaking the world record as well.
I have noticed that slowly the Africans of various nationalities have began to adopt South African sports people as our own as we do for other African nations again at major international events. If no Kenyans are running I cheer for the Africans. After the fall of apartheid the whole of Africa united behind South Africa. We all rejoiced when the Springboks won the rugby world cup in 1995. We congratulated them when Bafana Bafana won the African Cup of Nations a couple of years after that.
Slowly the goodwill starting fading away. Stories of racism in the Springbok camp, stories of South Africa using their economic might to bully other African countries (in Kenya we believe that South Africa tried to steal the Safari Rally from us as well as the rugby Safari Sevens), and some jealously as to the world Africa became South Africa (CNN’s Inside Africa programme might as well have been called Inside South Africa a few years ago).
But the tide has turned again. The World Cup bid focused heavily on the right of Africa to hold the event, and when South Africa won we all felt very proud. South African cricket is Kenya’s biggest ally on the international scene. In my experience the New Zealand All Black’s have been the most supported team amongst black rugby fans. A lot of it has to do with the cool factor (the haka, the kit), and the way the All Blacks traditionally play; fast, expansive rugby. But many also felt the All Blacks were, well, black. Or at least the blackest team around largely due to the large influx of players of Maori origin. But now the Springboks fly the African flag and their victory over Australia to win the Tri Nations for the first time since 1998 was celebrated amongst Kenyan rugby fans over here on Saturday. The Springboks have come back into fashion. Maybe its because of the number of black players in the squad. Maybe that doesn’t really matter. Maybe everyone just loves a winner.
One African who risks losing my support is Aziz Zakari who failed to finish in the men’s 100 metres final again. I’m beginning to get suspicious here. How come he only pulls up with injury when he notices everyone has flown away leaving him behind.
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