In 2008 and 2009 I visited South Africa and spent time in Cape Town & Durban, Joburg.
I visited the sites of the World Cup in all three cities.
In Cape Town, the stadium will be a white elephant. In Durban, the new stadium is next door to the Natal Sharks rugby ground. The soccer stadium will be a another white elephant.
In the townships around Joburg there are training stadia which will not have sufficent funding to survive once the World Cup is over.
In Soweto, though there is finally water, electricity and made up roads after 16 years of the ANC in Government, there is still far too much poverty and some of the housing is embarrassing. Corruption is rife.
Of course, soccer is the world's favourite sport and of course there will be many spectacular games over the next month. But few of the sports channels will bother to look behind the scenes and report on the corruption and poverty.
It was a real mistake to allow South Africa the world cup. She simply cannot afford it. If FIFA wishes to spread the gospel of soccer around the world then it must also pay for it too. Some chance.