The South African Football Association was founded on December 8, 1991, the culmination of a long unity process that was to rid the sport in South Africa of all its past racial division.
Four disparate units came together to form the organisation in Johannesburg to set the South African game on the road to a return to international competition after a lifetime of apartheid in soccer.
They were the Football Association of South Africa, the South African Soccer Association, the South African Soccer Federation and the South African National Football Association, who later withdrew from the process only to return again two years later.
It was only natural that the game finally be united as the sport of soccer had long led the way into breaking the tight grip of racial oppression, written into South Africa’s laws by its successive apartheid governments.
A delegation of the SAFA received a standing ovation at the congress of the Confederation of African Football (CAF) in Dakar, Senegal a month later,
where the South Africa were accorded observer status.
South Africa’s membership of the world governing body FIFA was confirmed at their congress in Zurich in June 1992.
Membership of CAF followed automatically and South Africa were back on the world stage.
Within a month the country hosted their first international match as World Cup quarterfinalists Cameroon came to play in three matches to celebrate the unity process.
The first encounter was played at Durban's King's Park Rugby Stadium and ended 1-0 to the South Africans with a late Doctor Khumalo penalty separating the two sides.
After a difficult start in international competition that included failure to qualify for the 1994 FIFA World Cup in the United States and the 1994 Africa Cup of Nations in Tunisia, the side began to find their feet and there followed an excellent period of success.
The side achieved qualification for the FIFA World Cup finals in France in 1998, the title of African champions at the 1996 African Nations Cup finals, which the country hosted, and the runners-up berth in Burkina Faso two years later.
It was only in 1996, at the African Nations Cup finals, that the country won international recognition with victory in the tournament at the first attempt. There were euphoric scenes as Mark Williams scored two second-half goals to give Bafana Bafana a 2-0 win over Tunisia at Soccer City.
There was to be even bigger success just over a year later when Phil Masinga’s exocet missile-like shot won South Africa a 1-0 victory over Congo and a place in the 1998 World Cup finals. It was the first time that South Africa had qualified for the greatest sporting show of them all and the team went on to draw two (Denmark 1-1 and Saudi Arabia 2-2) and lose one (France 0-3) of their three games in the finals in France.
South Africa also reached a second successive Nations Cup final this year, but lost their African crown in a 2-0 defeat to Egypt.
The side qualified for the 2002 FIFA World Cup in Japan and South Korea where they were unlucky to drop out in the first round on goal-difference to Paraguay after a win over Slovenia (1-0), draw with the Paraguayans (2-2) and a narrow loss to Spain (2-3).
They also finished third at the 2000 Africa Cup of Nations that was co-hosted by Ghana and Nigeria, before losing out in the quarterfinals to hosts Mali two years later.
From then on it has been a battle with first round exits in 2004, 2006 and 2008, before they failed to reach the tournament at all in Angola 2010.
The side have appeared at two FIFA Confederations Cup tournaments. The first was in 1997 as reward for their winning of the Nations Cup a year earlier and they travelled to Saudi Arabia with high hopes.
There they had an exciting tournament, but a draw with a very good Czech Republic side (2-2), was followed by defeats to United Arab Emirates (0-1) and Uruguay (3-4) to send them home early.
They were once again part of the competition in 2009 as part of the country's hosting of the 2010 FIFA World Cup and this time they did not disappoint.
After a slow start with a 0-0 draw against Iraq, they breezed past New Zealand (2-0) before losing to pre-tournament favourites Spain (0-2) in their final group game.
But it was enough to see them into the semifinals where they more than matched eventual winners Brazil before going down 1-0 to a late Dani Alves free-kick.
They met Spain again in the third-place play-off and lead with a few minutes to go in ordinary time before an unlucky 3-2 defeat in extra-time.
FIFA WORLD CUP HISTORY
1994 – Did not qualify
1998 – First Round
2002 – First Round
2006 – Did not qualify
FIFA CONFEDERATIONS CUP HISTORY
1997 – First Round
2009 - Fourth-place
AFRICA CUP OF NATIONS HISTORY
1994 – Did not qualify
1996 – Winners
1998 – Runners-up
2000 – Third-place
2002 – Quarterfinals
2004 – First Round
2006 – First Round
2008 – First Round
2010 – Did not qualify
COSAFA SENIOR CHALLENGE HISTORY
1998 – First Round
1999 – Quarterfinals
2000 – Semifinals
2001 – Semifinals
2002 – Winners
2003 – Quarterfinals
2004 – First Round
2005 – Semifinals
2006 – First Round
2007 – Winners
2008 – Winners
2009 – Fourth-place
| Coach |
Nationality |
Duration in charge |
| Stanley Tshabalala |
South African |
June 92-October 92 |
| Ephraim Mashaba |
South African |
October 92, April 01,
August 02-November 03 |
| Jomo Sono |
Peruvian |
Dec 92-January 94 |
| Clive Barker |
South African |
March 94-December 97 |
| Augusto Palacios |
South African |
January 98-February 98,
March 02-July 02, May 03 |
| Philippe Troussier |
French |
March 98-July 98 |
| Trott Moloto |
South African |
October 98-Sept 00, April 02 |
| Carlos Queiroz |
Portuguese |
October 00-March 02 |
| Kenneth Kubheka |
South African |
July 03 |
| Styles Phumo |
South African |
January-March 04 |
| Stuart Baxter |
English |
May 04-November 05 |
| Ted Dumitru |
Romanian |
December 05-January 06 |
| Pitso Mosimane |
South African |
May 06-November 06 |
| Carlos Alberto Parreira |
Brazilian |
January 07-March 08, October 09 |
| Joel Santana |
Brazilian |
June 08-October 09 |
