Barcelona are to travel to South Africa later this month for
a friendly with newly crowned South African champions Mamelodi Sundowns.
The match will be played at Soccer City, on the outskirts of
Johannesburg, on 16 May and it is the second time that Sundowns have brought
the Spanish giants out for a friendly match.
The
game will come just 24 hours after Sundowns play away in Conakry against Horoya
in the second of their Group C matches in the African Champions League.
They
will have to charter a plane to make sure they are back from Guinea in time for
kick-off at Soccer City.
In
2007, Sundowns billionaire owner Patrice Motsepe was alleged to have paid close
to U$1-million to bring Barcelona out for a one-off friendly, which the Catalan
side won 2-1 after being a goal down at half-time.
Motsepe,
a mining magnate and the brother-in-law of South African president Cyril
Ramaphosa, attempted in the past to forge close links with Barcelona and used
club legend Johan Cruyff as a sounding board at times.
It was
Cruyff who recommended two former Barcelona stars - Hristo Stoichkov and Johan
Neeskens - to coach Sundowns but neither had an impressive, nor lengthy, tenure
with the Pretoria-based club.
"The
plan was to make the announcement on Monday in Spain. Somehow it got into the
public domain and there have been so many enquiries," Motsepe said on
local radio as he confirmed the news.
"This
is the year of the Nelson Mandela Centenary year. We have partnered with the
Nelson Mandela Foundation."
It has
been reported that part of the agreement for the fixture is that Barca will
bring along their star names, such as Lionel Messi and Luis Suarez, though with
the World Cup in Russia looming, it remains to be seen how much time they will
spend on the pitch.
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