Bafana Bafana Coach is OVERPAID!!!

Carlos Alberto Parreira is being paid over three times more to coach Bafana Bafana than he earned at the helm of Brazil's 2006 Fifa World Cup side.

Parreira may well be currently the best paid national coach in the world after the departure of the monstrously overpaid Sven-Goran Eriksson from the England job after the World Cup.

Parreira, who is expected to arrive in South Africa any day now, was earning R6,75-million a year when he took Brazil to the quarterfinals in Germany.

His reward for what is in Brazilian terms a failure, is a hike in salary to a mammoth R21,6-million a year to take charge of Bafana Bafana through World Cup 2010.

There is a warning to South Africa in Eriksson's ultimate failure as England coach
And if you think that is ridiculous, even Parreira's assistant coach, at around R7-million a year, will be earning more than Parreira earned in Brazil!

Parreira's salary puts him ahead in earnings of any coach in Germany, bar Eriksson, who was earning that quite extra-ordinary R67,5-million per annum. Next in the list was Germany coach Jurgen Klinsmann, who picked up R20,25-million for his efforts.

There is a warning to South Africa in Eriksson's ultimate failure as England coach - that money cannot necessarily buy you glory, illustrated even more so in the figures relating to Italy coach Marcello Lippi.

Lippi was earning merely R13,5-million a year when he took the Azzurri all the way to World Cup glory.

Interestingly, Australia coach Guus Hiddink, who got the Socceroos to the last 16 and was once seriously touted for the South Africa job, earned only R3,38-million a year for his job with the Aussies. He has, of course, since moved to Russia, but even his salary there, at around R17-million a year, is less than Parreira's.

'Sven stuffed his pockets, and then he stuffed us all'
It is now well known that Fifa have given the South African Football Association R70-million towards the betterment of South African soccer, and, given Parreira's salary and that of his assistants, it seems Safa have decided to put pretty much all their eggs and then some into one Brazilian basket.

Criticism of such an enormous salary is inevitable, and comparisons have already been made with president Thabo Mbeki, who earns a mere R1,2-million a year. In South Africa, where many people live below the poverty line, the amount appears even more grotesque. It is hoped that Parreira, now 63 years old, is not coming to South Africa merely to pick up an extremely healthy retirement annuity.

Of course, should he succeed in winning the 2008 MTN Africa Cup of Nations, as well as the 2010 edition, and reach at least the World Cup quarterfinals, Safa will parade themselves as national heroes, claiming money well spent.