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| Image by Moses Msiza |
Have you been to a PSL game recently? Have you watched a PSL game recently? Did you even notice anything different in stadiums?
Let me tell
you what I’ve noticed, more voices. No, I don’t mean there are more bums on
seats at the games now, but you can hear more voices because there is this
little thing called the Vuvuzela that is hardly seen at the stadium
anymore.
Remember when
the Vuvuzela was supposed to be for us what the Mexican wave was for Mexico in
’86? Something that the traveling soccer fanatics could take back to their homeland,
and it would become part of the lexicon of future world cup tournaments.
Well, it
didn’t happen the way we pictured did it…
The
reception to our vuvuzelas was lukewarm at best, with many internationals not
liking the idea that this instrumented was to replace chanting and singing at
games. The vuvuzela was called noise pollution and a distraction at games. They
tolerated it because it was our local thing that they had to deal with since
they were coming to our country. They didn’t like it. The football fraternity
had rejected our offering…
We started
to question the use of the vuvuzela in our games, especially since the most
enthralling fans in the PSL at the time, Bloemfontein Celtics never used to
need them. So, over the years we have seen a decline in the use of the vuvuzela
at our stadiums, which is great as it made the atmosphere at the stadium better
and not just drowned out by noise.
The
rejection of the vuvuzela by the world has been a blessing in disguise. Slowly
but surely, we are bringing back singing and chanting (Boo’s don’t count as
chanting) to the stadiums, which gets more fan engagement than what the
vuvuzela did. It started making the stadium a tad more fun and family friendly
again.
The world cup might have created white elephants, but it also created the demise of that loud horn. For that, I’ll forever be thankful.
