SA women field 13-year-old amid WC pay dispute

A standoff between South Africa‘s Women’s World Cup squad and the nationwide soccer affiliation over pay and different points compelled officers to discipline a makeshift group of little-known gamers that included a 13-year-old for a recreation towards Botswana on Sunday.

The sport was imagined to be the ultimate warm-up match for the African ladies’s champion on dwelling soil earlier than it headed off to the Ladies’s World Cup in Australia and New Zealandbut it surely was a humiliation on and off the sphere as your complete World Cup squad sat out the sport.

South Africa’s group of substitute gamers — rapidly pulled collectively from native golf equipment — misplaced 5-0 to Botswana on the Tsakane Stadium close to Johannesburg. They had been 4-0 down at half-time in a recreation that was delayed for an hour on the request of the South African Soccer Affiliation (SAFA) so it might scramble and put collectively a group.

South Africa coach Desiree Ellis stated one of many gamers she needed to draft in was aged 13. In a postmatch interview, she did not touch upon the issues.

The World Cup gamers solely arrived on the match at half-time, after they emerged to look at from the stands.

SAFA additionally did not instantly touch upon what sparked the standoff, however Thulaganyo Gaoshubelwe, the president of the South African Soccer Gamers Union — which represents the pursuits of soccer gamers — stated the incident was partly brought on by poor pay for the gamers.

“They’re combating for his or her rights,” Gaoshubelwe stated of the South African gamers in a video posted on his union’s official Twitter account. “SAFA would not need to embrace cash of their contracts. We should combat for the rights of those gamers.”

Gaoshubelwe, who was standing subsequent to a few of the gamers outdoors the group lodge within the video, stated their complaints had been “dismissed” by SAFA. He was additionally seen in discussions with the gamers and accompanied them to the stadium after they turned up at halftime.

Gaoshubelwe claimed SAFA president Danny Jordan was accountable for the standoff.

South Africa Sports activities Minister Zizi Kodwa stated in an announcement he could be assembly with the gamers’ union on Tuesday “to listen to the intense considerations expressed by the group.”

The assembly could be in regards to the gamers’ “welfare” and points associated to their contracts, Kodwa stated.

The squad is because of fly to New Zealand in two teams on Tuesday and Wednesday.

The South African Broadcasting Corp. reported that gamers had been additionally aggravated that their farewell recreation earlier than the World Cup was held on the Tsakane Stadium, which holds simply 5,000 individuals and isn’t a high-profile soccer venue.

The gamers seen that as a mark of disrespect for them from their nationwide soccer affiliation, the SABC reported.

SABC and different tv networks broadcast photographs of the World Cup squad members standing round outdoors their group bus at a lodge shortly earlier than the sport was resulting from kick off. SAFA CEO Lydia Monyepao was seen talking with the gamers.

South Africa received the Ladies’s African Cup of Nations final 12 months for his or her first main title, but the gamers have usually complained that they don’t seem to be given the popularity or advantages that the boys’s group will get.

South Africa is because of play Costa Rica in New Zealand on July 15 in its ultimate World Cup warm-up recreation. South Africa performs Sweden, Argentina and Italy within the group stage on the World Cup, beginning towards the Swedes on July 23.