SOUTH AFRICA OPENS WORLD CUP

The World Cup came to Africa on Friday for the first time, and South Africa proved to be an eager and proud host, if not a completely satisfied participant. Bafana Bafana, or the Boys, as South Africa’s team is known, took a lead in the second half but could not hold it as Mexico scored in the 79th minute to forge a 1-1 draw before 84,490 at Soccer City Stadium. But if South Africa did not win, at least it did not lose. With group matches remaining against Uruguay and France, it can maintain hope — however slight — that it will not become the first host nation to exit before the second round. Ultimately, a long-awaited day was rewarding if not decisive. Sixteen years after the end of the racial policies of apartheid, South Africa affirmed both that it was ready to host the world’s biggest sporting event and that it could hold its own against some of the world’s top soccer competition. “The time for Africa has come,” Jacob Zuma, South Africa’s president, said before the match. “It has arrived.” Logistical issues must still be resolved. Traffic jams left some seats empty at kickoff. And it remained to be seen how efficiently fans could be transported out of the stadium. Still, as Tlou Chokoe, a 53-year-old accountant, put it, “Now we can say that we are able to do things that no one gave us any chance of doing.” South Africa entered the tournament under enormous pressure, which was evident in a nervous and cautious first half. Zuma had voiced expectations of winning the tournament, which seems highly unlikely. No African team has advanced beyond the quarterfinals, and South Africa is ranked 83rd in the world, above only North Korea in this 32-team field. The hope of an entire continent, not merely a country, seems to weigh heavily on the shoulders of Bafana Bafana. That hope swelled again in the 90th minute only to be dashed when a dangerous shot by forward Katlego Mphela glanced off the goal post. “We are still in the competition; I can’t ask for more from the Boys,” said Carlos Alberto Parreira, South Africa’s coach. “They did not disappoint us. I’m very happy. We could have won with some breaks.” South Africa relaxed in the second half, unfurling its speed on the counterattack. A beautiful diagonal pass came out of the midfield in the 55th minute. Siphiwe Tshabalala sprinted onto the ball and rocketed a left-footed shot just inside the right goal post for a 1-0 lead. The crowd erupted with the din of plastic trumpets, called vuvuzelas, and Tshabalala and four teammates celebrated with a theatrical chorus line dance on the sideline. But Mexico, which had dominated play for much of the game, only to be thwarted by missed opportunities, did not withdraw. In the 79th minute, a substitute midfielder, Andrés Guardado, fired a cross to the unmarked defender Rafael Márquez, who blasted a shot from 6 yards past the otherwise impenetrable goalkeeper Itumeleng Khune, leveling the score at 1-1. Friday’s one bittersweet moment came in the absence of former President Nelson Mandela. He canceled a scheduled appearance after his 13-year-old great-granddaughter was killed in an automobile accident Thursday night on the way home from a pre-World Cup concert in Soweto. It was hoped that Mandela’s presence might summon the same kind of inspiring and galvanizing moment that occurred when South Africa won the 1995 rugby World Cup here, as dramatized in the movie “Invictus.” Yet Mandela’s spirit and influence in attracting the World Cup were still evident in the stadium. “You must start the game,” he said in a statement conveyed through Zuma. “You must enjoy the game.” Several fans interviewed equated the expectation and excitement present on Friday to Mandela’s release in 1990 after 27 years in prison. “Everyone is together around the country, embracing,” said Mabule Mothapo, a 35-year-old doctor. “We are not black or white; we are just South Africans today.” Maintaining unity after the World Cup will certainly be a challenge in a country that is still struggling to provide the basic necessities of electricity and running water to everyone. Still, Soccer City Stadium, built in the shape of a calabash, a gourd used as a cooking pot, was for a few hours Friday also a melting pot. Soccer is primarily the sport of blacks in South Africa, while rugby is the sport of whites. Ever so slightly, there is increasing crossover. A rugby match was played recently in Soweto, and Friday’s soccer match drew blacks and whites who stood shoulder to shoulder in the stands, waving the South African “rainbow nation” flag, wearing shirts in the green and white of Bafana Bafana, and participating together in a pregame ceremony that featured traditional African costumes and dances. “It’s like a political party that has to move from right to left or left to right,” said Jens Schutte, 38, the chief financial officer of an automotive company, who is white. “Whites are moving more toward soccer, and blacks are getting interested in rugby.” All over Johannesburg, the national flag of South Africa flew in a crisp breeze on Friday. Even the sideview mirrors of many cars bore covers in the shape of the flag. Eight or nine hours before kickoff, the vuvuzelas were in full throat. Inside the stadium they blew incessantly, sounding variously like duck calls, trumpeting elephants, rumbling motorcycles and swarming bees. A number of dignitaries attended the opening match, including Desmond Tutu, the retired Anglican archbishop from South Africa who won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1984. He wore a Bafana Bafana scarf and danced along to the pregame music in his box. Hours before the tournament, Tutu told reporters that he could not have dreamed that South Africa — isolated from international sport for nearly three decades until the early 1990s — would host the World Cup one day. “I’m dreaming; wake me up,” Tutu said Thursday at the Soweto concert. “We want to say to the world, Thank you for helping turn this ugly, ugly worm, or caterpillar, which we were, into a beautiful, beautiful butterfly.” If this World Cup begins to change the way the rest of the world views Africa — rebutting stereotypes of poverty and conflict — then it also might change the way South Africans view themselves, said Trod Maloba, a doctor. “This gives us a vision of the future, and whatever that may be, we know collectively that nothing is impossible,” Maloba said. (NY Times)