🇿🇦 A World Cup odyssey, South Africa's difficult road to Mexico | OneFootball

South Africa’s national football team is already on its way to the 2026 World Cup, but not without some prior drama.

The 'Bafana Bafana' are heading to Mexico a day later than planned after being caught up in a full-blown bureaucratic mess: they were grounded on Sunday because they did not have the visas needed for a stopover in the United States.

This unexpected logistical problem prevented the team from taking off on their charter flight and sparked major political anger.

Gayton McKenzie, the country’s Sports Minister, exploded on social media, calling the situation "shameful" and fiercely criticising the federation for making the players and coaching staff look bad.

Crisis meeting on Sunday night

To solve the crisis, the South African Football Association (SAFA) called an emergency meeting on Sunday night.

There, they confirmed that the entire squad now has all its paperwork in order, although work is still being done against the clock to secure visas for four members of the backroom staff, including the doctor and the assistant coach.

Change of plans for the head coach

The delay disrupts the plans of head coach Hugo Broos. The Belgian manager wanted the team to be based in Pachuca from June 1 to ensure proper acclimatisation to the city’s extreme altitude and overcome jet lag well ahead of their official debut, scheduled for June 11.

With the aim of protecting the training camp and preventing these organisational failures from happening again in North America, SAFA has created a fast-track management committee made up of three executives.

In addition, the federation has apologised to the fans and expressed huge gratitude to the U.S. consulate, which worked through the weekend to save the team’s trip.

This article was translated into English by Artificial Intelligence. You can read the original version in 🇪🇸 here.