Sharp knives to keep our soccer aspirations alive

Skinning Sierra Leone will avoid nightmare of another Afcon failure

Cairo is where South Africa's immediate soccer dreams will either be realised or shattered in the next three months.

What Bafana Bafana need to do to secure their Afcon spot in Mbombela on Saturday is a no-brainer - they have to get out their best Okapi knives to skin Sierra Leone in their final qualifier.

Divine intervention may be needed, so massive prayers from Bishop Tutu and the Dalai Lama would be welcomed if they can help South Africa avoid the catastrophe of failing to qualify for consecutive African Nations Cups.

Both final qualifying matches in Bafana's group - Bafana v Sierra Leone and Egypt v Niger - will kick off simultaneously on October 8 to prevent skulduggery.

After his initial lunacy, when he insinuated Egypt were hellbent on hampering SA's qualification by using their national under-23 side for the remainder of the Afcon qualifiers after a bad start, Bafana coach Pitso Mosimane ceased his mumbo jumbo.

Mosimane's rant was caused an unfounded conspiracy theory that, because Bafana beat Egypt for the first time and held them to a draw - effectively ending the seven-time African champions' chance of qualifying for Equatorial Guinea and Gabon next year - they would try to make the route easy for Niger.

Niger top Bafana's qualifying group by a point and look best-placed to reach the finals.

Mosimane must keep to his end of the bargain and not worry about events in Egypt.

Bob Bradley, the new coach of Egypt, is a winner by virtue of his long stint as US mentor, most notably in South Africa last year when the US lost 2-1 to Ghana in extra time in the second round of the World Cup.

By using their under-23s, Egypt are ushering in a new era.

The Olympic group will graduate to the senior side now that the old crocks have finally reached a cul-de-sac in their careers.

With Bradley watching from the stands against the Mena, the new crew will want to leave an indelible impression on the American.

They will not want to miss out on selection when Bradley announces his team to take on the selecao of Brazil in a friendly in November. More importantly, they would want to be the forerunners of a new era, new heroes taking over from a fading golden generation of stars such as Mohamed Aboutrika, Wael Gomaa, Sayed Moawad and captain Ahmed Hassan, who were central to Egypt's domination of African football in the last decade.

The dawn of a new era for the Pharaohs may well work in Bafana's favour. They just have to beat Sierra Leone and leave the rest to take care of itself.

In November, Baby Bafana will travel to Egypt, for an eight-nation African shootout for London 2012 Olympic qualification.

Three of the eight nations will qualify automatically, with a fourth side having to play a home-and-away qualifier against a well-placed under-23 side from Asia.

Coach Shakes Mashaba's side has been drawn in Group A with Ivory Coast, Gabon and the hosts, while Algeria, Morocco, Nigeria and Senegal complete Group B.

Safa need to ensure Mashaba is in the stands in Cairo for the game between Egypt and Niger on Saturday so that he can get a close-up look at what is coming his way as he seeks to repeat the magic feat of Sydney 2000.