Pakistan badly missed in South Africa

From the Tangos used for Italia 1982 to the Teamgeist used in Germany 2006, Pakistan-made footballs have been an icon of the country’s representation at the global events as the team itself has failed to qualify for the tournament.

The country is renowned for producing and exporting quality footballs amid other sports goods. And in the last three decades, Fifa have been the leading buyer of Pakistani footballs, relying on these for their competitions.

Over the last decade, Pakistan, on average, exported 40 million footballs worth $210 million, produced annually by 60,000 highly-skilled labours. However, for this year’s World Cup, Fifa opted for Chinese footballs, named Jabulani, and from there, the scenario did not look good for Pakistan’s manufacturing industry or for the event itself.

Jabulani is not a hand-stitched football as opposed to the ones made from leather panels in Pakistan. Instead, the thermally-bonded Jabulani - which means ‘celebration’ in Zulu - has been labelled by Fifa as “the most stable and accurate ball ever made”.

In practice, however, these new footballs are not up to the mark and the footballers who have to deal with it are clearly dissatisfied with its shape, design and material used. Fifa may not have spoken out against it but the individuals, especially the goal-keepers, are publicly criticising the quality after dealing with it in their training sessions, warm-up matches and during the World Cup itself.

France goal-keeper Hugo Lloris called it “catastrophic”, Brazilian Julio Cesar termed it “terrible and horrible” and “like the ones you buy in the supermarket” and the Italian legend and World Cup winner Gianluigi Buffon said it was “shameful to play a World Cup with this ball”.

Similarly, there is a major flaw in Jabulani’s design. According to European media, it looked more like a potato than a football and that led to uneasiness on the players’ part to kick, shoot and head it desirably. Italian striker Giampaolo Pazzini echoed the goal-keepers’ view by saying,  “It wasn’t just a problem for the goal-keepers but also the strikers as when a cross comes in and you line up to head it, then the ball moves by half a metre and you end up missing it.”

While the organisers have confirmed that the football was tested out prior to the event, they must realise that a World Cup is not a venue for experimentation and in a tournament like this, there is no room for a product that is cheap and below-standard and causes problems for the players.



M Wasim is a freelance journalist

Published in The Express Tribune, June 30^th, 2010.