When South Africa won the rights to host the 2010 FIFA soccer World Cup, very few expected that the poorest country ever chosen to stage the worlds greatest sporting event would pull it off. Detractors always had the feeling that FIFA always had a replacement in waiting just in case South Africa failed even at the last moment. But they were proved wrong.

Some elements of the world press devoted much of their time and space discussing the possible challenges that could arise especially in relation to violence and crime. For a country that just emerged from international isolation just a little over a decade and a half ago, the odds were really stuck against it. The racist apartheid system past looming hideously above South African society and even recent unrest buy black South Africans against foreigners from other African countries all spelled doom and gloom.

But all these fears turned out to be wrong and misplaced. The Rainbow Nation managed to host arguably the most successful world cups in its entire tournament history. Though the host nation was eliminated in the first stages in the tournament that was eventually won by Spain when they pipped the Netherlands in the final, every South African has every reason to feel proud of their country.

With new infrastructure and new jobs created to show for it, the first ever ‘African World Cup’ can by all means be said to have been superbly and excellently organized. According to the 2010 Local Organizing Committee chairman Irvin Khoza, everything went as planned and that’s enough a reason for every South African to feel proud.

FIFA president Sepp Blatter too was full of praise fro the host country saying they exceeded his expectations, which in a way vindicates his fight since he came to the helm of the world soccer governing to have an African country host the tournament under his watch.

All said and done, Spain emerged as the eventual victors on the pitch but South Africans can pat themselves on the back as victors in more than one aspect. Never before in the tentatively racially tense nation has a sport so united the whole country for one cause and purpose.