RIP Clive William Barker (23 June 1944 – 10 June 2023)
It's no coincidence at all that Clive Barker drew his last breath on a Saturday, a day that is associated with football matches the world over, for he was a football man through and through. Though a serious knee injury curtailed his playing career in 1969 having had spells with Durban City and Durban United, as well as a trial stint at Leicester City, this opened up an opportunity to venture into coaching… and boy, did "The Dog" grab the opportunity and run with it. The list of clubs he took charge of is evidence of not only how clubs changed coaches at the drop of a hat in those days, but also of how he was a man in demand. Mzansi is all the poorer for the passing of Mkhulu, as he was affectionately known in his home province of KwaZulu-Natal. Barker's former player at AmaZulu FC, George Dearnaley's tribute, via Soccer Laduma's Lunga Adam, continues this week.
Lunga Adam: Jijo, we can talk the whole day about Clive Barker the man, the coach, the human being. There must surely be some special moments that you can share.
George Dearnaley: At AmaZulu, what a group! I mean, we had Pat Gumede, Tim Nzoyi, Norman Steenkamp, Barry Barret, Steve Baverstock. There's a lot of us that still stay in touch, and I asked the guys to share some of the funny stories, and the guys came with lots of stories, even stories I couldn't remember or I wasn't there. We had this defender, Shaun Dafel – small, white guy. Left back. Shaun fancied himself, he thought he was the ladies' man. So, we played the last league match against Santos in Cape Town, which would have been in November 1993. We beat Santos at Athlone Stadium and then we went back to the hotel. All the guys were showering, getting changed, everyone's going out. It was a Friday night. We were in the hotel bar and a couple of the guys were there with Clive. Shaun came in, he had white jeans, he had a long-sleeved blue shirt with the collar, he had gel in his hair, his hair was all spiked up, he looks like he's ready to go looking for a lady tonight. His nickname was Dafey. We all turn and look at him, and then Clive takes a sip of his beer and he looks at him and he says, "Dafey, I tell you what, you are no Robert Redford, my son!", Meaning, "You are not good-looking!" Ha, ha, ha, oh, we were killing ourselves laughing.
LA: Ha, ha, ha.
GD: He killed it. To this day, 30 years later, we still say, "Dafey, you are no Robert Redford, my boy!" He killed him! In the dressing room, if you were wearing the wrong thing or you did something, ey, you would just hear Clive. He would kill you with a comment and the rest of the team would all be laughing at you, so you had to be very careful around him. The other thing about him is that because he was short and he walked with a limp because of his knee injury, the guys would also sometimes try make fun of him, but he had all the answers because I think he'd heard all those jokes before, you know. We never called him Clive – we called him "Mr B" or "Coach" or whatever. You'd ask him, "Hey Mr B, did you ever score a header?" because he was so small. Then he would turn and look you up and down and then say, "Let me tell you about how many goals I scored." Then he'd tell you 10 stories about goals he scored with his head for Durban City, Durban United, and then especially the black guys would be laughing. Then he would turn to Joe Mlaba, who was short, and say, "Joe, why are you laughing? I'm taller than you! I'm taller than you, you Satan!" Ha, ha, ha. We laughed a lot, man. We were happy. Because some coaches you are so scared of them, you know. Some coaches you think if you make a joke, he's going to think you're not serious about your football, but footballers are human. You can't be serious the whole time. Especially in that AmaZulu team, we had a lot of jokers. Clive knew the right moment to say the right thing. There was Sazi Ngubane against (Kaizer) Chiefs in the league in Durban.
LA: What happened?
GD: I think five minutes to go, Sazi clashed his head with Albert Bwalya. Albert was fine, but Sazi had a big cut in his head and he was concussed. He didn't know where he was, he was dizzy. Clive ran on and he came with 2-litre water and some Vaseline. He put Vaseline on the head and he poured water on Sazi's face, then slapped him on his cheek and said, "Hey Sazi, why usaba maan (are you scared man), why usaba? Hey, come on son! The ancestors are watching you!" Sazi, his eyes were focused, he's ready. He played the last five minutes and he was fantastic. After the game, walking to the dressing room, Sazi collapsed. Unconscious, loss of blood, everything. Then Clive said, "Look after him now, he's done his job." But he needed to get five more minutes out of him, otherwise we were 10 men. He had to tell him, "Don't be scared, your ancestors are watching you, everything's fine." I was standing right there and I thought, "Hey, this guy's gonna die." But again, he knew the right moment to do and say the right things to get the best out of his guys. So, we will miss him. But Lunga, the most important thing is that Clive was an unbelievable South African. In a time when, I'd say, most white South Africans weren't that interested in the rest of South Africa or South Africans, I think Clive always cared about his players. He never saw black, white, coloured, Indian – he never saw that. He saw good people. He wouldn't tolerate anyone who said something wrong about blacks, whites. He didn't tolerate that at all. He would put you in your place if it was a joke and tell you, "Hey, don't say that again." I mean, he told me a story once of taking a team to Kimberley, I think, where he knew it was whites only in that hotel and he booked 10 rooms or whatever it was. It was him and… I can't remember who the other white guys that were with him at the time were, but he said it was only two or three white guys. They went in, they registered, they got the keys, and the lady asked, "Where's the rest of your players?" He said, "No, no, they are visiting Kimberley, they are looking at the Big Hole, they are coming later." Meanwhile, all the black and coloured guys were still hiding in the bus, ha, ha, ha. Then they went in and opened all the rooms. They opened the fire escape at the back and all the black and coloured players were sneaking up the fire escape into the hotel rooms. He was doing that in the '70s! It was illegal! He could have been jailed in those days, but he was looking after his players, and I think those are things we must never ever forget about him.
LA: What an incredible man. Do you think he was appreciated or honoured enough while he was still alive?
GD: He's appreciated now. Now he's appreciated, but at the time, in 1997 after that Nations Cup result in 1996, the Bafana team didn't do that well in the Confederations Cup, but Clive was using that tournament not to win it but to look at players for the '98 World Cup. I heard his conversations directly from him. He was using that as an opportunity to look at combinations, to look at players, because his focus was on the '98 World Cup. He wanted to get out of the group, and SAFA made a terrible decision to fire him, you know. I have no doubt, if Clive had been the coach of that '98 World Cup team, they would have got out of that group. Because we drew with Denmark and we drew with Saudi Arabia – he would have beaten Saudi Arabia. He wasn't appreciated then. I think success came too quickly for us. We were only readmitted to FIFA in 1992, four years later you're the African champions, and six years after readmission you qualify for the World Cup. People thought it was too easy. They didn't appreciate then how hard it was and how well he had done, but now they look back and they go, "Yho, the only Nations Cup we ever won was (in) 1996!" Since then, how many coaches? Nothing. So, now he's appreciated, but I really wish... I mean, we can't turn the clock. I think the right thing to do now is he needs to be honoured at the highest level, whether that's a stadium named after him. I saw someone suggesting that maybe Soccer City must be named after him… the Barker Calabash or something… but honestly, he really needs to be honoured at the highest level because, like I said, (he was) a great coach, but a great South African human being.
LA: Great suggestion.
GD: One other thing an ex-player told me, he said he'll never forget how much kindness was in Clive's eyes. There was always kindness there, and I never thought about that before. You know, especially with players coming from townships, from backgrounds that were not the best, to find a coach like that that was so well-known but so kind and interested in you individually, I think that was… Like Julius Chirwa, he loved Clive. He called him my father. If we were mocking him, we would say, "Hey Mr B, have you got a stone in your shoe? Why are you walking like that with a limp?" "Gonondo" (Chirwa) would say (mimicking his deep voice), "Hey, hey, hey, guys, please, that's my father. Please, guys." Ha, ha, ha. Shadrack Biemba, Joe Mlaba, they all… we all loved him. Everyone loved him. Even Robert Redford loved him, ha, ha, ha. We will miss him terribly.
LA: Ha, ha, the good-looking Robert Redford. Ah, man, such beautiful memories!
GD: Ja, great memories. Nothing but great memories. Even when he substituted me and I took off my boots. We were playing against Wits (University) in Jo'burg. He took me off with 10 or 15 minutes to go and it was 0-0. I thought, "I'm gonna score here, why is he taking me off?" I took my boots off and I threw them against the advertising (boards). After the game, we went to the change room, then he came looking for me. I thought he was gonna hit me! Yho, he swore at me in front of all the players! "Who do you think you are? Who do you think you are?" Ey, I was nearly crying and kept saying, "Mr B, I'm sorry! I'm sorry, Mr B!" I never ever did that again. Ever. Ja, he was lovely, man, really lovely.
LA: By the way, for those who're not aware, you're a coach these days. How has Clive Barker influenced the way you coach?
GD: I try and keep my coaching… put it this way, I try not make it too complicated for players, especially young players. Clive always said, "Stick to your job. Focus on your job. If you are the striker (like in my case, target man), you need to hold the ball up, you need to show for it, shield it, protect it, bring the midfield into play, get in the box, get on the end of things, don't hide." I always think that some people can really complicate the game by giving a player a hundred things to think about, but it's really a simple game. So, if I can be 5% of the coach Clive was, then I would be doing a great job because football is not an easy game, but it is an easy game, ha, ha… you know. It's like it's really a basic game of invasion – we're trying to get into their goal area, they're trying to get into ours, we need to organise ourselves, you need leaders. So, I always think about the spine that Clive used to talk about: the goalkeeper, the central defenders. The strong characters down the middle of the field. I think that you can't have the same message for every personality. People are different, different characteristics, different backgrounds. And he was the master, there's no way I could ever get close to that, but I think I'm working out which personality can you shout at and can you demand more from, and then there's other ones you have to put your arm around and talk quietly to because they are just different personalities. I'm still learning how to manage people, but there were lot of lessons to learn from Clive, the most important that anyone could learn from Clive is 'never be something you're not'. Be yourself. Be the person you are and be respectful of everyone's situation, and don't tolerate, never tolerate people that are arrogant, ignorant and not nice people. He never tolerated that. If he saw someone was talking rubbish about somebody else, he'd tell them, "Stop. You are wrong. Don't come here with that story."
LA: Sure.
GD: I can't remember the journalist, but there was a journalist that was digging and the questions were almost to try and put the blame on one of the players, whom I also can't remember. Like, "Yes, Clive, I understand your answer, but so-and-so could have done this…" and he just said, "Hey, have you ever played football? Have you ever been in that man's shoes? Do you know the problem at his home? Do you work with him every day like I work with him? Because if you don't, don't come asking questions. I'm playing him because he can do the job and I trust him." So, he would protect his players, but he wouldn't tolerate unnecessary rubbish, put it that way. I like to joke, but I also don't like to tolerate the rubbish that people can talk about other people – it doesn't help anybody. So, treat people with respect, have humour and try and create a happy family first. A happy family first will give you a good football team.
LA: Well said. Thanks so much for your time, Big G. Our sincere condolences.
GD: Okay, Lunga.
What He Told Shoes And Doc…
Helman Mkhalele – Former Bafana Bafana winger
"I received the news with great shock on that Saturday morning. Even though I knew he was not well for quite some time, I was shocked when I heard about his passing. I could not believe it and it took me some time to come to terms (with the fact) that he is no more, especially when you look at the great work he did for South African football, including (for) myself because I benefitted from working with him. He did a lot for this country. We won the Africa Cup of Nations in 1996 and he helped us to qualify for the World Cup in 1998, even though he was not there. He took South African football to another level. We improved in our FIFA rankings and at some stage we were number 16 in the whole world, and it was based on the hard work he put into the team. He made sure that we worked towards one common goal. He made everyone realise the importance of representing South Africa. He had an incredible ability to know the strengths of every player. When I received the ball on the wing, he'd say, 'Take him on, Helman.' He knew that my strengths were speed and taking people on, so he'd encourage me to do it without any fear. I wasn't scared of defenders because of his contribution. He did the same thing with other players. He'd tell Shoes (John Moshoeu) to make the opposition dance. He'd say, 'Shoes, I want you to make those people dance.' He'd tell Doctor Khumalo to 'shibobo' the defenders. He'd speak to every player because he knew the strengths of each one. He worked on the minds of the players to make sure we were confident, and we had to operate within the structure and game plan. He played a big role in South African football and he will definitely be missed."
