Amateur hour in Cape Town

Back in the winter of 1990, when I started watching Cape Town Spurs and Hellenic at the glorified chicken hok that was Hartleyvale Stadium, footballers essentially played for fun. From 9am until 5pm, they were shoe salesmen, plumbers or van drivers.

The Afro-coiffured Reggie Jantjies's "salary" from Hellenic probably just about covered his budget for square combs and lubricant hair products. Thabo Mngomeni's monthly pay packet from Cape Town Spurs might have bought him half a dozen Burning Spear LPs and a parcel of Swazi parsley. The young Andre Arendse surely hoarded a couple of his cheques to invest in a patchwork leather jacket complete with MC Hammer shoulder pads.

Cut to the present, and Premier Soccer League footballers earn juicy incomes. They work in gob- smacking stadiums. Their "day jobs" include such occupations as PlayStation, Twitter and removing the knickers of part-time models. But the standard of PSL football in Cape Town this year is scarcely better than it was in 1990 - because the standard of club administration could hardly be worse.

Don't look now, but Cape Town football has decided to go amateur all over again.

Last year, Santos ambled down to the more peaceful environment of the National First Division. This year, Chippa United and Ajax Cape Town appear to be hungrily competing for the drop. It's possible that both could succeed, leaving the PSL without a Cape side for the first time next season.

At both clubs, the mismanagement has been remarkable in its courage and consistency.

Chippa Mpengesi has axed five coaches in less than a season. He may be a feisty entrepreneur, but you have to wonder about the future of any businessman who actually enjoys firing people. If the Chilli Boys do dodge the drop, it will be a travesty.

Meanwhile, at Ajax, the feuding Comitis and Efstathiou families, who share a 49% stake, have all but driven their club to the brink of ruin - just two seasons after the Urban Warriors came within one game of the league title. Under Foppe de Haan, an exuberant, intelligent Ajax side looked like the future of South African football. All of a sudden, they look like the distant past.

Three of the finest players from De Haan's reign - Thulani Serero, Sameehg Doutie and Clayton Daniels - have been sold. Those were natural and inevitable sales. But none of that trio has been adequately replaced.

In the past week, Ajax CEO George Comitis has provoked the resignation of coach Jan Versleijen - and enraged the parent club, Ajax Amsterdam - by appointing Muhsin Ertugral as technical director without consulting either party. A disinvestment is now on the cards.

A peeved Ajax Amsterdam director of football, Marc Overmars, told De Telegraaf on the weekend: "There are several options for us in the coming months. If stopping [the relationship] costs money, that does not matter. In South Africa they seem to forget that we have 51% of the shares. We will not be gentle in [dealing with the situation]."

Ertugral is a good bloke and coach. He might just help save Ajax from the drop.

But if the Urban Warriors' management "team" contrive to scare off the financial and intellectual capital of Ajax Amsterdam, they will not only damage their club, they will hurt South African football as a whole.

Who knows? Ajax Cape Town might even join Hellenic and Cape Town Spurs by gaining the dubious distinction of extinction.