Ngcobo 2010 and Jimmy Jump have an enthusiasm and spring in their step that would put Tigger (from the popular children’s series Winnie the Pooh) to shame.

For those not in the know, Ngcobo 2010 is the nickname for Thulani Ngcobo, the new Guinness World Record holder for attending the highest amount of World Cup matches (38), in the process destroying the previous record of 20 World Cup matches.

The feat was made possible when he won MTN’s Last Fan Standing competition, claiming the prize of 38 match tickets. Ngcobo 2010 proudly claims to attend all Kaizer Chiefs and Bafana Bafana games played in South Africa.

Jimmy Jump on the other hand is the Spanish football fan famous for never missing an opportunity to be thumped by stadium security and thrown out of an arena, for wrongfully entering the field of play.

The local PSL football league needs more fans like both them.

I want to be clear from the start that I’m not advocating the kind of antics Jimmy gets up to. I personally don’t enjoy pitch-invasions, and quite frankly, I don’t think anyone would have complained if stadium security had conked him on the head with the 8kg golden Coupe du Monde, which he had tried to adorn with a barretina (a type of Mediterranean hat that Jimmy typically likes to use in his on-field antics) at the World Cup final last Sunday. He knows the risk he takes when vaulting the advertising boards.

As it was, Jimmy was floored (inches away from success) by a single blow delivered by a security official probably more accustomed to disabling several armed guerillas while juggling live hand-grenades and simultaneously stitching closed a bullet-wound to his chest himself. The impressive official defended the trophy without adding the slightest wobble to the golden prize atop its pedestal (for the record, about thirty other security guards then joined the fray, taking turns to body-slam Jimmy and drag him along the turf, using the teeth in his open mouth as a rudimentary plough for the stadium turf).

I’m also not going to pretend that pitch-invasions by fans are born solely out of passion for the particular sport and its players, rather than the invader’s own quest for personal fame (or infamy depending on which side of the security barrier you sit).
Jimmy in fact proves this point by stating on his official website that he won’t stop “jumping” (onto the field of play) until he reaches his goal of acting in Hollywood (one assumes he is hoping to become famous enough to be offered a starring role of sorts in a film – perhaps he will soon invade the big screen to be flattened by Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson in a typical star-spangled grid-iron classic).

Yet it is ironically in his rather selfish use of football to achieve his higher goal, that Jimmy provides us with the most radical example of how South Africans can help themselves and strengthen the PSL.

Here’s what I mean: South Africans are already very familiar with the idea of using sport to achieve a higher ideal – like nation building. We’ve even acted on it (radically) at the 1995 rugby World Cup and this year’s football World Cup. At both events South Africans who hadn’t previously supported either respective sport, made conscious decisions to become fans for the sake of spurring on the national teams to greater heights, and for the greater national good.

Wouldn’t it be great to see South Africans who haven’t watched or attended the PSL much or at all previously, making conscious decisions to become supporters of a particular PSL team, and thereby the league, in a similar manner?

In so doing, South Africans would go a long way to building national football: a better-supported PSL would mean more ticket, television and advertising money that could be used for football development. Provided such funds were used optimally, this would in turn enhance the PSL and strengthen Bafana Bafana.

At the same time, across the (racial) board attendance of games would maintain the current momentum of racial interaction and common ground that World Cup 2010 has provided.

South African football officials obviously need to do their part to make the PSL more attractive to fans, so that it can compete with other forms of Saturday afternoon entertainment. An issue that gets raised in this context is that of racial representation on the field: Dr Danny Jordaan alluded to this at a press conference recently, mentioning that changing the composition of players on the PSL field would possibly fill stadia more multi-racially. This is a topic on which one could pen an article all of its own. Suffice to say, merit-based selection in South Africa is possible with visible talent in the junior leagues across racial lines.

For their part, fans of football and of South Africa need to decide whether the chicken comes first or the egg: will they wait for a better league before they start attending matches, or will they attend matches in the hope of helping to create a better league (and simultaneously, a more unified country)? I’m hoping it’s the latter.

I’m also hoping that aspiring young footballers provide the spark necessary for reform, by getting their parents to take them to local PSL games in the hope of understanding their most likely route to the professional level (obviously many players would like to end up in overseas leagues, but most will generally have to pass through the PSL first).

While I certainly wouldn’t want to see a Jimmy-clone invading the pitch to plonk a makarapa on Siphiwe Tshabalala’s dreads as he’s about to score a winning header, the truth is the crazy Spaniard does exhibit the kind of single-mindedness in pursuit of a goal, that would fill PSL stadia, and in time, create more Ngcobo 2010s.

At the end of the day, we would all be a bit better off if individual South Africans decided to become the First Fan Standing this PSL season.