How Cape Flats 'gangster league' prepared Benni McCarthy for Europe

By the time he moved to Ajax Amsterdam at the age of 19, Benni McCarthy was already battle-hardened by the unforgiving streets of Hanover Park on the Cape Flats. 

The Cape Flats is notorious for gang violence and that’s where McCarthy honed his football skills from an early age, where he played in the notorious “gangster league”, also known as “Bundesliga”, before he caught the attention of Cape Town Spurs and Seven Stars. 

McCarthy, who remains the only South African player and one of the few on the continent to have won the Uefa Champions League, remembers how those matches were often disrupted by rival gangs shooting at each other. 

McCarthy, who reached the dizzying heights of European football with Ajax Amsterdam, Celta Vigo, Porto, Blackburn and West Ham, said the dangerous streets of Hanover Park and the gangster league toughened him up.

“I played in the gangster league on the Cape Flats — we used to call it the Bundesliga, like the Germans,” he said, adding rival gangs used to unite through the gangster league to support their teams, though there were occasional confrontations during hard-fought matches. 

“That was most exciting because you see guys every week running and shooting each other, but on Sunday they have their football teams competing and there is peace. 

“That was the power of the game in such a tough environment, because it was able to unite even the worst of enemies. They will share a beer because they had their football teams playing against each other, but the next day everything changes.  

“I was involved in the league, it was an upbringing where I played against grown men and it toughened and prepared me for where I was going.” 

African footballers have suffered racism in Europe and McCarthy said because of his tough upbringing, he was able to deal with people throwing bananas at him at some matches. 

“If I didn’t survive there [gangster league] — where sometimes you had to lie on the ground when people were shooting at each other and when they finish we get up and play on like it is normal — I don't think I would have survived a whole stadium with people throwing bananas at you and telling you that you don't belong there, telling you to go back go back to Africa, to the mountains and the bush.

“I would never have been prepared for that and probably I would not have made it if I didn't play in the ‘Bundesliga’. 

“I survived playing football where they used to shoot guns at me. That is the only thing that can scare the lights out of me, but not your words or throwing bananas at me. I am immune to that.” 

McCarthy, who is Bafana Bafana's all-time top scorer with 31 goals, is widely regarded as one of the best players South Africa has produced — but he admits he could have gone down the wrong path. 

“It was not easy growing up in Hanover Park, especially when you are surrounded by people who chose the wrong path. I didn’t go in that direction because I used to sit at home because my father was strict and that helped me. 

“I was also scared, so I focused on my school work and went to church while everyone was doing other things with gangs on the streets. Sitting here and talking to you, I thank God I listened to my parents because I would probably not be here [if I hadn't]. 

“I would probably be a distant memory in people’s minds, that we once had a good player but rest his soul because that’s what happens to everyone. That was Hanover Park growing up, you become a gangster and you don’t see the age of 21.”