Commitment Honoured:

“We need to nurture talent and there is a need to integrate all races in club and school teams,” said former South African great and one of the few players in our country to be recognised by the Confédération Africaine de Football (CAF), Bernard Hartze. “Former top players, irrespective of colour must be approached to serve on coaching structures at provincial and national levels.”

Hartze displayed his football talent in South Africa, United States and briefly in England too. His illustrious career saw him star for Sundowns: – now Mamelodi Sundowns – Orlando Pirates, Cape Town Spurs, Cape Town United, Tamba Bay Rowdies in USA. He also had a trial at Leeds, but was sabotaged by aprtheid denying him the seven international caps that legendary Leeds United manager Don Revie said were needed. Revie was being a tad disingenuous.

Courage and Principle:

Hartze recalls he was part of a group of teenagers who helped revive Sundowns in 1964. His older brothers Roy and Reggie (both deceased), as well as his life long friend Yazeed (Joey) Lawrence, Sunny Boy Chauke, Pro Motsepe and Ingle Singh were among his team mates.

The teenage goal-predator whom Sundowns’ fans nicknamed ‘Dancing Shoes’ in recognition of his nifty footwork and also his Cliff Richard hit-parader, ‘Dancing Shoes’ in the early 1960s, soon earned to play professional football.

Hartze defied the inhuman apartheid laws that forbade so-called coloured or white players from joining black football clubs in Soweto when he teamed up with greats like Kaiser Motaung and Chippa Maloi at Orlando Pirates. Blackpool continued the link begun the great Sir Stanley Matthews with South Africa. The legendary footballer had no truck with apartheid and is still revered here as well as in his homeland.

Joe Lawrence: Hans Moses, Ralph Hendricks and Gareth van der Haar continued his legacy. Like Matthews they played for Blackpool FC. Rashied Khan was used to play for Bosmont. They shared Hartze’ dreams and commitments and became part of a talented Pirates team along with Hartze.

All of them knew that scarifices were needed just to play and they risked everything to ensure that football played an important part in the fight against apartheid. “The police often followed our cars when we entered Soweto and they could have jailed us for entering Soweto without permits, but backed off when we were surrounded by thousands of fans on our way to Orlando Stadium, Hartze recalled of the days of confrontation for the right to play for everyone – a battle that was won thanks to people of integrity like Hartze.

Shameful:

The pressure of fielding a non racial team and contravening the law soon took its toll on Pirates. The club bosses reluctantly told Hartze and his coloured team mates to leave because the authorities had the power to ban Pirates from the municipal stadium if they deliberately flouted the laws. Football and South Africa lost out.

In 1967 he went to England for trials with Leeds United who was coached by Don Revie and rubbed shoulders with the likes of Jack Charlton, Billy Bremner, Terry Cooper and Peter Lorimer, who would soon become one of the great English teams of the 1970s. Hartze was suppose to sign for Leeds but Revie told him that he had to have at least seven international caps in order to sign professional forms and offered him apprenticeship instead.

As Hartze pointed out this was ridiculous. “I was not allowed to play for my country then because of the Apartheid Laws in the sixties so where was I supposed to get seven caps from?” Revie and Leeds had the opportunity to make a statement against a crime against humanity and do it for football reasons. Hartze was good enough to play for the club. It should have happened, especially under these circumstances.

But there was another indication that Revie was making excuses. Leeds already had a black player at the time and he was South African – the flying winger Albert Johanneson – who joined the club in 1961 after a recommendation from a South African school-teacher. Johanneson played for Leeds for nine seasons without a single international cap to his name for the same reasons that Hartze could not get one. The Johanneson precedent should have been applied by Leeds for Hartze, or at least the absurdity should have been pointed out to the governing bodies. Instead Hartze returned to South Africa immediately.

Football Ambassador:

In 1970, Don Richards had his finger on the pulse of football across South Africa. He was given the task of launching and managing the Cape Town Spurs FC in the old Federation Professional League (FPL). Hartze achieved what Richards had expected – top goal scorer. He spearheaded the attack, won the FPL and knock out cup in his debut season too. “Don encouraged the short passing game and the fans loved our style of football,” enthused Hartze before he was ready to spread the word on South African football to an international audience once again.

In 1975, South African born Eddie Fermani a former Charlton Athletic player, who managed Tamba Bay Rowdies then took Hartze to the USA. Hartze enjoyed a promising start in the US where the legendary Pelé was speding his twilight years at the New York Cosmos. Niggling injuries kept him on the sidelines and eventually he was loaned out to the Sacremento Spirits.

“I was extremely disappointed that the injuries cut short my stint in the US and I missed out on making it big in the States,” Hartze said. The highlight of his career was when the CAF honoured him for his contribution to football at an awards ceremony in 2007. Hartze shared the stage with other South African greats including Vince Belguims: Puzzy Janzen, Godfrey de Kock, Kaiser Mataung, Bobby Charmers and Jomo Sono at a ceremony at the Cape Town International Convention Centre. Africa’s World Cup rekindled Hartze’s passion to develop young talent in coaching and life skills programmes that he regularly holds across the Cape peninsula.