Madiba's Boys:
the Stories of Lucas Radebe and Mark Fish
Lucas Radebe and Mark Fish are two of South Africa's
greatest footballers. It is also the story of a country in
transition. Madiba's Boys takes us from the early years
of the two players, one black and one white, from
football played with rolled-up old socks on the dusty
veld, to the glamour and passion of the English
Premiership and the World Cup. It traces the struggle
for liberation in the township of Diepkloof, and the
backlash of apartheid Pretoria, to the establishment of
a democratic state. We follow Mark's and Lucas's
efforts for Bafana Bafana, at times heroic, at times
controversial, as they steer their national side from African soccer baby to giant in less than a decade.
“***** Brilliant... The biographical detail is often fascinating... Better than that, this is also a social history of a country coming to terms with itself after years of violent political upheaval... This is not just a the-ball-came-over-and-I-hit-it biography - it is a fully fledged human drama with an incredible backdrop.”
- Total Football
South Africa: New Africa Books, 2001
United Kingdom: Comerford & Miller, 2001
“In its portrayal of a changing South Africa and of the
difficulty in adapting the unfamiliar, sometimes racist England, this is a worthy read.”
- The Independent (London)