A few years ago a livid colleague said: "Jomo Sono is not the alpha and omega of South African football."
A few years ago a livid colleague said: "Jomo Sono is not the alpha and omega of South African football."
I have since forgotten what the issues were, but the statement has somehow stuck in my mind as if it were said yesterday.
Back then, I had debated the correctness of the statement, but recent developments have proved that Sono is, in fact the beginning and end of the local game.
Surely, he is one soccer boss who is allowed to do and say things as he pleases and gets away scot-free. It is either that, or society is guilty of picking on soft targets.
Before my commentary is subjected to all sorts of convenient interpretations, which I know it will, let me hasten to point out that I am all for the view that louts must be seriously dealt with, but not some of them.
Kaizer Chiefs got what was coming and so must Orlando Pirates and Moroka Swallows. Isaac Chansa disgraced football as a player and must be dealt with.
Is it not surprising, though, that everybody has expressed their anger on the Zambian and called for punitive sanction, though no one is prepared to say anything about a club chairman (Sono) showing the middle finger to supporters in an already volatile match?
Does somebody know something we do not know? Was the picture in the Sunday Times manipulated? Was Sono's head super-imposed on some hoodlum's body?
Or was Sono telling someone to take a corner kick at the far post? If video material is used as evidence, then so should stills camera material.
Trevor Phillips, Zola Majavu and all those who pop up after the fact and pretend a profile of a soccer player as that of choirboy-butter- would-not-melt-in-his-mouth, your silence is deafening.
One would have expected to, at least, hear someone condemn such behaviour and recommend an investigation. Jomo Sono is a club chairman, for God's sake.
I don't know what makes his offence less serious than that of Pitso Mosimane v Angel Cappa, Owen da Gama's "obscene gesture", but I know he carries the same clout as fellow chairman Kaizer Motaung and Irvin Khoza. Soccer is his business.
The timing of Sono's action could not have come at a worse time because crowd misbehaviour is spiralling out of control.
Damn it, we are speaking here of the chief ambassador for 2010, 2002 Bafana Bafana World Cup and 1998 African Cup of Nations coach. The face of South African football.
It is no secret that he still harbours ambitions of sitting on the Bafana Bafana bench in 2010.
PSL, also act on Sono
A few years ago a livid colleague said: "Jomo Sono is not the alpha and omega of South African football."
A few years ago a livid colleague said: "Jomo Sono is not the alpha and omega of South African football."
I have since forgotten what the issues were, but the statement has somehow stuck in my mind as if it were said yesterday.
Back then, I had debated the correctness of the statement, but recent developments have proved that Sono is, in fact the beginning and end of the local game.
Surely, he is one soccer boss who is allowed to do and say things as he pleases and gets away scot-free. It is either that, or society is guilty of picking on soft targets.
Before my commentary is subjected to all sorts of convenient interpretations, which I know it will, let me hasten to point out that I am all for the view that louts must be seriously dealt with, but not some of them.
Kaizer Chiefs got what was coming and so must Orlando Pirates and Moroka Swallows. Isaac Chansa disgraced football as a player and must be dealt with.
Is it not surprising, though, that everybody has expressed their anger on the Zambian and called for punitive sanction, though no one is prepared to say anything about a club chairman (Sono) showing the middle finger to supporters in an already volatile match?
Does somebody know something we do not know? Was the picture in the Sunday Times manipulated? Was Sono's head super-imposed on some hoodlum's body?
Or was Sono telling someone to take a corner kick at the far post? If video material is used as evidence, then so should stills camera material.
Trevor Phillips, Zola Majavu and all those who pop up after the fact and pretend a profile of a soccer player as that of choirboy-butter- would-not-melt-in-his-mouth, your silence is deafening.
One would have expected to, at least, hear someone condemn such behaviour and recommend an investigation. Jomo Sono is a club chairman, for God's sake.
I don't know what makes his offence less serious than that of Pitso Mosimane v Angel Cappa, Owen da Gama's "obscene gesture", but I know he carries the same clout as fellow chairman Kaizer Motaung and Irvin Khoza. Soccer is his business.
The timing of Sono's action could not have come at a worse time because crowd misbehaviour is spiralling out of control.
Damn it, we are speaking here of the chief ambassador for 2010, 2002 Bafana Bafana World Cup and 1998 African Cup of Nations coach. The face of South African football.
It is no secret that he still harbours ambitions of sitting on the Bafana Bafana bench in 2010.