Way before his reputation as a prolific goal poacher, Lesley Manyathela once came on as a substitute in the second half, only to be taken off 15 minutes later.
It was actually his first game in Dynamos colours right in Thohoyandou.
For any footballer, getting pulled out in the same match in which they have been subbed on is an embarrassment, an indignity that very often can transform into a rage if one is not in control of their emotions.
For Manyathela, then only a teenager, it was no different. After those 15 minutes of shame, he was in fact ready to pack up his bags and leave. He had seen enough of Thohoyandou, and his boots pointed him towards Musina, his hometown.
“His first game was against Mabopane Young Masters in the first division,” former Dynamos ace Salthiel ‘Sathi’ Phasha tells FARPost. “We were losing 2-0 in the second half and the coach introduced him as a sub and took him out after 15 minutes. He wanted to go back to Musina after that game, but I sat down with him and told him not to give up.”
It had taken only a quarter of an hour for Manyathela’s new life in Thohoyandou to begin unravelling. Although South Africans did not know it, a nation was now in danger of never seeing one of its sharpest ever goal poachers progress from beyond amateur football.
Manyathela had found himself at Dynamos through the efforts of Josam Ndou, who had seen him turn out for the unfashionable Tshelamoya in Musina and felt that he could dazzle even more in Thohoyandou. Ndou felt that this gangly young lad with an unrivalled nose for goal, deserved a bigger stage.
“He was my homeboy and also my brother-in-law. He had a child with my cousin. I had seen him playing for Tshelamoya and I approached my bosses at Dynamos to tell them there was a player who was really good. I told Lesley it was time to leave Musina and try his luck in Thohoyandou,” Ndou tells FARPost.
Ndou would be the first to admit that he did not know what to make of this prolific gangly kid. As he grew up, despite his obvious talent, he was a reluctant footballer, seemingly playing the game only half-heartedly despite the fact that he was frighteningly good at it. At Dynamos, that cloud, that suspicion would also follow him. The talk in Thohoyandou was that Manyathela did not even take seriously that most sacred ritual of professional football – training.
“Interestingly, Lesley didn’t really want to take football seriously at the time. It was until he came to Dynamos that he started seeing how much football could do for him. In any case, he was still young, and still at school.
“He seemed not to want to train, but it changed with time. He looked like a lazy player. He was training once with us because he was still schooling in Musina,” recalls Ndou.
After that ignominious 15 minutes in Thohoyandou, it seemed as if Manyathela the reluctant footballer would remain a local sensation whose talents would only bring cheer to crowds in Musina. However, in Phasha, he found a big brother who would not let him quit so easily. He just could not let him give up on his undeniable talent.
“The next game was against Arcadia Shepherds, and we were 3-0 down. The coach introduced him as a substitute, and I remember telling him that it would be easier in Pretoria away from our home fans. Home games were tricky because of pressure from fans. He scored five goals that day and we won 5-3,” remembers Phasha.
After that five-star showing in only his second senior team outing, it began to dawn to all and sundry at Dynamos that they had a gem on their hands. As he settled in, he would once start finding the net with shocking frequency. Despite fears that he was lazy, Phasha noticed that the lanky boy who did not talk much with his teammates was actually quite driven. On the pitch his movements were slow but sure…they were poisonously deadly.
“One day we played against Mapate Silver Stars in a derby, and he told me he wanted to score six goals. He actually scored six and we won 6-1. That’s when they started calling him Slow Poison.
“When we were going to Mapate Silver Stars that was the first time I saw him talking. He said ‘this game I’m going to score six goals.’ Whenever we were struggling, he would say gents give me the balls. He would say ‘grootman, just pass me, I’ll score’,” says Phasha.
With Manyathela’s career taking off in Limpopo, it was not long before the big boys began sniffing. Soon, at only 19, he would find himself on the books of Soweto giants Orlando Pirates and coaches at Bucs would bear witness to the drive, the electrifying ambition that had taken the young forward from the backwaters of Musina to the bright lights of Jozi.
“The first time I saw him, he was playing at Thohoyandou Stadium and we were on a roadshow looking for players for the national under 20 team,” Augusto Palacios tells FARPost.
“He had the height, and he was the type of striker who is always in the right position in the area. He was a prolific striker.”
At Dynamos, Manyathela had acquired the uncanny habit of predicting his own goal tally before some matches. Whether it was prophetic insight or the accurate confidence of a man who knew his abilities fully well, it was a gift that always took his teammates by surprise.
“That’s how this boy was,” recalls former teammate Innocent Chikoya. “He would tell you that today I’m going to score, and he would do that. The time he became top scorer he predicted he would be top goal scorer and he would score 22 goals [18 league + 4 in cup competitions], 22 was his jersey number coincidentally. He was such a character,” Chikoya tells FARPost says.
At Dynamos, Manyathela had been irresistible, scoring goals for fun against defenders who just could not cope with his insatiable appetite for goal. The PSL however, was an altogether different proposition and no doubt some would have been wondering if he could cope with the rigours of the domestic top-flight. However, such fears were unfounded as Manyathela’s seemingly delayed, languid movements inside the box lulled top-flight defenders into a false sense of security before he inevitably pounced.
“He was very slow, but poisonous, very deadly – running lazily, sluggish but that was only until he had the ball in the box. He would score different goals, header, and tap-ins. He had natural talent,” adds Chikoya, the former Bucs left-back.
The 2002/3 season had placed Manyathela on the cusp of footballing superstardom. An integral role in Bafana seemed on the cards, as did a move to some of Europe’s stronger leagues. Then on 9 August, tragedy struck. 30 kilometres from Musina, where he was on his way to spend time with his mother, South Africa’s greatest goal scoring prospect died instantly when his car overturned.
“It was painful, it’s still painful. I miss my son because we had a very close relationship. I think of him, I think of the beautiful memories we shared when he was alive. I miss him so much and it’s very painful. I’ll never forget that I once had a precious baby. My son was precious to me,” the late goal poacher’s mother Gladys Manyathela says.
For Phasha, a man who had provided Manyathela with a shoulder to lean on after a disastrous debut, the memory of that tragic August night is still fresh.
“I was like a brother to him. I remember the day he died, he called me every 30 minutes as he was driving home on that day. I was shocked to later get a call from his brother that Lesley had died. It was painful, the boy had a bright future,” he says.
It was a tragedy that shook South African football at its foundations, with every football lover in the country finding it hard to come to terms with the fact that he was gone.
Manyathela’s death deprived South African football of a once in a generation finisher who perhaps, could have shaped the fortunes of the national side for the better over the next decade. The 2010 World Cup on South African soil would probably have come while he was at the peak of his powers.
As South Africa struggled in front of goal in the intervening years, the wound caused by his passing ached just a little bit more. However while it was a great loss to the game, for his family, the loss was even more personal. He was a son that left a mother that will never stop grieving, a father that left a boy who has now lived the greater part of his life without a father.
For Phasha, other than the prolific goal-scorer he was, Manyathela should also be remembered as a humble young man who, at the height of his popularity, never allowed fame to get to his head.
“One day when he was in the national team preparing for a game against Ivory Coast, I was at Winners Park. We shared the same hotel with the national team.
“He came to me with R6000 and said ‘grootman, you made me what I am, please have this’. I was shocked. It meant a lot,” he says.
Eighteen years after his death, the PSL and Bafana Bafana are still missing goal scorers like Manyathela. They usually say ‘no one is irreplaceable’, but not so with ‘Slow Poison’. May his soul rest in peace.
