How soccer’s ‘gambling games’ build the sport in South Africa

TARMINDER KAUR|

IN outlining how soccer is played in South Africa, an executive of a soccer club in the rural Cape Winelands district of the country’s Western Cape province, explains that the sport has two structures: organised and unorganised.

The organised structure, he explains, falls under competitions endorsed by the South African Football Association. Under the unorganised structure, anyone can organise a competition for money and any team can come and play. However, the football association does not allow clubs affiliated to them to play unorganised soccer, and vice versa.

Colloquially known as “gambling games”, the unorganised structure of soccer among the working people has been the focus of my doctoral and post-doctoral research. Before embarking on my fieldwork research among farm workers in a commercial agricultural region of Rawsonville in the Western Cape, my impression was that there was little sporting action in the lives of this exploited workforce.