Andile Mpisane Andile Mpisane, the chairman of Royal AM, has featured heavily for the club owned by his mother. Photo: Instagram/andilempisane10
Image: Instagram/andilempisane10
Sometimes, you don’t need a lot of talent to become a professional footballer. You just need powerful parents, whose influence can unlock many doors.
In South Africa, this has been seen at disgraced KwaZulu-Natal club Royal AM, where Andile Mpisane has often made the starting lineup in the Betway Premiership.
His selection has often put his team on the back foot, leaving the other players having to work extra hard just to level things up. This was seen in their game against Kaizer Chiefs towards the back end of last year where they were way off the pace in the first half, but showed a lot of improvement once he was off the pitch in the second 45 minutes.
Without Mpisane on the field, Royal AM recovered from 2-0 down to earn a 2-all draw against the mighty Amakhosi.
Get your news on the go, click here to join the IOL News WhatsApp channel.
The young Mpisane is not a footballer. He did not spend years and years in an academy learning the game. Instead, he became a professional footballer after his mother, Durban businesswoman and socialite Shauwn Mkhize bought him a club for his 19th birthday.
Nepo babies in football is not just a South African phenomenon, but something that is common across the globe.
In the early 2000s, Al-Saadi Gaddafi, son of former Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi, had a long career as a footballer and administrator. The young Gaddafi served as the country’s football federation president and national team captain at the same time.
He also spent three years in Italy’s Serie A, where he was attached to Perugia and Udinese. He played just two games.
In England, Darren Ferguson wasn’t a very good footballer. However, due to his father being Manchester United’s legendary manager Alex, the young Ferguson played 29 times in all competitions for the club.
During the inaugural Premier League season in 1992/93, Baby Fergie featured often, and finished the season with 15 appearances. After leaving the club, he found things a bit tough without his dear old dad, and had to settle for clubs like Wolverhampton Wanderers – who were in the second tier – and then Division 2 Wrexham.
Recently, Ferguson, who is the manager of Peterborough United, made news for denying Tyler Young an opportunity of featuring in an FA Cup tie against Everton, where he would have been on the field with his father Ashley Young.
“We’re not a charity case,” Ferguson would say when defending the decision.
In the States, Harvey Neville, son of Phil Neville, somehow found himself training alongside Lionel Messi, the greatest player that ever lived, at Inter Miami. It was strange because young Harvey wasn’t very good, and was only given a chance because his father had been the club’s head coach.
Without his father, Harvey is playing in America’s lower leagues, where he is struggling for regular game time.
And then there’s Romeo Beckham, who somehow found himself on the books of Premier League club Brentford despite not being very talented as a footballer. According to a few clips on social media, he could bend it like Beckham, but that was all that he could do.
The young Becks rode the wave created by his father’s fame, and retired at just 21 when it became apparent that he did not inherit Golden Balls’ footballing abilities.
IOL Sport