South Africa at the 2026 World Cup: the Cassiem brothers and a team that wins without money

In the opening match of the Nations Cup in Cape Town, on home soil and with a sold-out Hartleyvale behind him, Mustapha Cassiem limped off the pitch with an ankle injury. The best hockey player South Africa has ever produced would miss the rest of the tournament. What followed was the opposite of a collapse: without their star player, South Africa knocked out defending champion New Zealand and reached the final, before France held firm in the closing act.

That is the tension this team carries to the 2026 World Cup. South Africa is in every respect the team of the Cassiem brothers, captain Dayaan and his younger brother Mustapha, but in June it proved it can win even when that axis falls away. That makes the Cassiems indispensable and dispensable at once, a paradox that colours the entire tournament. This dossier shows how a federation without money keeps dominating Africa and qualifying, why the Cassiems form the heart of the South African game, and where the limit lies in the brutal pool with Australia, Spain and Ireland.

World ranking and qualification

South Africa begins the World Cup as by far the highest-ranked African nation on the FIH world ranking, but as the lowest-ranked team in its own pool. That divide is the whole story: on the continent South Africa is a powerhouse, on the world stage an outsider that has never made it past the group stage.

The ticket for Belgium and the Netherlands was earned the way South Africa has known since readmission: by winning Africa. At the Africa Cup of Nations 2025 in Ismailia the team beat arch-rival Egypt 5-1 in the final and claimed the only direct African World Cup spot. It was the ninth continental title, and confirmation that no other African nation comes close.

That continental dominance is at the same time a pitfall. Because Egypt is the only serious opponent on the continent, South Africa misses the weekly grind against the world's best that the European nations do get. The team qualifies with ease, and is then confronted at a World Cup with a level it can practise against nowhere at home. South Africa is moreover far removed from the world's top: where European nations cross the border for a friendly, the federation has to travel far and at great expense for an opponent of any stature. The home Nations Cup of 2026 was precisely for that reason so valuable, because it was the rare moment when the world's top came to Cape Town instead of the other way around.

South Africa was banned from international hockey in 1964 and only readmitted in 1993. A year earlier, in August 1992, five racially segregated hockey federations merged into the non-racial South African Hockey Association. The team's history therefore really only begins in 1994, and from day one bears the stamp of the transition the whole country went through.

All of South Africa's World Cup appearances

South Africa was absent only in 1998 and plays its eighth World Cup in 2026. The thread running through it is unrelenting: seven appearances, seven times failing to survive the group stage. The best results, a tenth place in 1994 and 2010, are by now more than ten years old.

The major tournaments

A world title South Africa has never won, and will not win in 2026 either. The trophy cabinet fills up elsewhere. The continent has belonged to the AmaStokke ever since readmission: every Africa Cup of Nations the team contested also went home with it. It is a hegemony that commands respect and at the same time says little about the world level, because the gap with the rest of Africa is simply too big. In 2022 South Africa moreover won the inaugural FIH Nations Cup in Potchefstroom, with a 4-3 in the final against Ireland, and at Paris 2024 it posted its best ever Olympic result with a ninth place, including a 5-2 win over hosts France.

The purest highlight came in under a roof. At the 2025 indoor World Cup in the Croatian Poreč South Africa took bronze by beating third-seeded Belgium 6-5, the country's first ever World Cup medal in any form of hockey whatsoever. Mustapha Cassiem was named Player of the Tournament there, with a hat-trick in the bronze-medal final. It was a medal the team brought home while at the start of the journey it was still uncertain whether the funding would come together, which in South African eyes made the achievement all the greater.

Recent editions

The last two World Cups sum up the range of this team. In 2018 in Bhubaneswar it went wrong: heavy defeats against India and Belgium, a single point from a draw with Canada, and as the last of sixteen nations the worst World Cup in their history. In 2023, again in India, it looked more mature with an eleventh place, although there too a win against a top nation stayed out of reach. That is the paradox South Africa has lived with for thirty years: good enough to take part, too lightweight to break through, and always in search of that one upset that breaks the pattern.

Philosophy and approach

No one had Devon van der Merwe pegged as national coach this season. The Director of Hockey of Hilton College, a reflective coach with a background at the big KwaZulu-Natal hockey schools, was the assistant when things fell apart, and stepped up as interim head coach. What he brings is a people-centred approach focused on development and well-being, and an undiluted tactical identity. South Africa must play fast, aggressively and relentlessly: "They're not afraid to take chances. They're brave, and that's exactly what we want in South African hockey, a style that's fast, aggressive, and unrelenting", as he puts it himself. His three words for the run-up to the World Cup are just as level-headed: building depth, cohesion and belief, in a preparation window he honestly calls "far from ideal". The fact that he lifted this team from a governance crisis to a home final in such a short time gives him a credibility that no tactical theory can replace.

The coaches before him: Ewing, Gie and the Ntuli affair

Van der Merwe is the fourth national coach in barely four years, and that is no small detail. Garreth Ewing laid the defensive foundation between 2019 and the end of 2022 and professionalised the training approach. Under him South Africa pulled off not only the upset against Germany (4-3) at the Tokyo Games, which earned them an invitation for a season of Pro League, but also their first ever win over New Zealand at a major tournament and a first Commonwealth Games semi-final in twenty years. Ewing was a finalist for FIH Coach of the Year in 2022. Under Cheslyn Gie, who took over from university hockey in 2023, the philosophy switched to attacking freedom and an extremely high speed of play: players were given the mandate to decide for themselves, even when that produced mistakes. The result was the Nations Cup title, an eleventh place at the 2023 World Cup and the Olympic record in Paris.

After that it got messy. In January 2025 the federation appointed Sihle Ntuli, the team's first black African national coach, but within a few months came a suspension and a disciplinary case that ended in his dismissal. Ntuli is still contesting the outcome legally to this day and speaks of a process that was "unfair, unjust and procedurally flawed". Into that vacuum stepped Van der Merwe, and he stabilised things in a way few expected.

Paris, Africa and the one-goal year

Van der Merwe delivered the proof on the continent. At the AFCON 2025 things still got out of hand against Egypt in the group stage, with a handful of cards and a chaotic 3-3, but in the final he stressed discipline and cool-headed set-pieces, and Egypt were swept aside 5-1 after all. The prize for it, the World Cup ticket, was exactly the goal he had named beforehand.

No Pro League, but the Nations Cup

South Africa do not play in the FIH Pro League; the money and the structural slot for it are lacking. The path runs via the Nations Cup, and that is precisely where Van der Merwe did his best work. At the home Nations Cup of June 2026 in Cape Town South Africa reached the final via a semi-final that told you everything about this team. Against defending champions and world number eleven New Zealand, who had been unbeaten in the entire history of the Nations Cup and were coached, of all people, by South African former international Greg Nicol, South Africa were missing both Mustapha Cassiem and Nic Spooner. Even so, a flowing run by Jamie Seale set up Kenton Melville for the 2-1, and when New Zealand equalised late, goalkeeper Cullin de Jager saved all four shoot-outs. The final against France went differently: Victor Charlet and Etienne Tynevez put the visitors 0-2 up within eight minutes, and although Sam Mvimbi pulled one back to 2-1 with a reverse from a tight angle and South Africa forced three penalty corners and even an empty goal in the closing stages, France held firm. Silver on home soil, and a team that stood tall with its head held high.

The staff under Van der Merwe

Alongside interim head coach Devon van der Merwe, the technical staff consists of team manager Martin van Staden and a broad group of assistants, among them Guy Elliott, Jacques le Roux, Kurt Cerfontein, Ashlin Freddy and Devin Stanton, with Daiyaan Solomons as physiotherapist and Myles Usher as strength and conditioning coach. SA Hockey president Deon Morgan and high-performance director Reggie Smith form the governing framework.

Training group June 2026

The most recent official selection is the twenty-strong group for the Nations Cup in Cape Town. The definitive World Cup eighteen will only be made official later. Most players are provincially based (Western Province, Southern Gauteng, KwaZulu-Natal), with a handful of pros in Europe. Striking is how young the group is: alongside the experience of Spooner and Lembethe stands a whole batch born after 2000, a sign that the federation is deliberately building towards the cycle leading to 2029.

Six key players

Dayaan Cassiem is the talisman and captain. The forward of AH&BC Amsterdam, with whom he won the Dutch national title in 2025, is the starting point of every South African counter: explosive sprints, and the ability to slice through the most compact defence with the ball at his feet. He has been captain since 2022 and led the country to Paris 2024, where he struck a late double against hosts France.

Mustapha Cassiem is the younger brother and the most dynamic talent the country has ever produced. He is a versatile forward with fabulous technique in tight spaces, honed in indoor hockey where he was named Player of the Tournament at the 2025 World Cup. He is also the first penalty corner taker, with a drag flick in which an extremely late wrist movement sends the goalkeeper the wrong way. Indoors he is a phenomenon altogether, with well over a hundred international goals and, in early 2026, a third consecutive Nkosi Cup title as Player of the Tournament. His ankle injury from the Nations Cup makes his fitness in August the single biggest question of the whole tournament.

Cullin de Jager is the breakthrough of 2026. The goalkeeper, also a regular between the posts for the South African indoor team, was named the tournament's best goalkeeper at the Nations Cup and saved all four New Zealand shoot-outs in the semi-final. A late bloomer who worked his way up from a small school through the provincial rankings, and who stays level-headed about it: if he does his job, he says, the team gets a chance.

Nicholas Spooner is the veteran and the engine in midfield. With 87 caps and a career going back to a previous hockey era, he is the playmaker who feeds the Cassiems up front with gossamer overheads, and one of the players who showed younger internationals the way to professional hockey.

Samkelo Mvimbi is the forward who strikes in the quiet of a big moment. The Paris Olympian scored the consolation goal in the Nations Cup final with a fierce backhand from a tight angle, exactly the kind of goal that makes a deficit tense again.

Kenton Melville is the face of the breakthrough. The young forward made his debut in the Nations Cup opener and grew within a week into the finisher on duty, with four goals in four matches, including the 2-1 in the semi-final against New Zealand. He embodies the other half of the Cassiem story: when the stars drop out, a new generation evidently stands ready to fill the void.

And that generation is broader than Melville alone. Ayakha Mthalane scored his first two international goals against the United States and forced himself into the picture, Carlon Mentoor is a plague for man-markers with his unpredictable runs, and Niel Raath worked his way up to international level through dominant displays at the domestic interprovincial tournament. It is exactly the kind of throughput a federation without money needs: talent rising up from below.

Competition analysis by line

The Van der Merwe system

South Africa wants to make the game fast. The side presses high up front and defends in a disciplined, compact shape behind it, looking for the moment of the turnover to switch in the blink of an eye into a lightning transition. If that press is broken, the team folds back into a closed block rather than letting itself be pulled apart. Against a resolute block it can grow impatient, as Van der Merwe noted himself after the 4-0 against the United States: only once the opponent let up in the second half did the space open up in which the South African runners found their rhythm. So it pays to judge this team in the second and third quarters, when the upfront intensity begins to wear the opponent down. And when it has to chase, the side does not hold back: in the Nations Cup final South Africa threw everything forward in the closing stage, with three penalty corners and the goalkeeper pulled, hunting for the equaliser.

The Cassiem axis

At the heart of the attacking play is the understanding between the brothers. "We just know where to find each other", Mustapha says of Dayaan, and on the pitch it looks like a set choreography: after a turnover Mustapha seeks out the axis standing upright, while Dayaan launches a diagonal run in behind the defence. The rest of the attack, the young finishers Kenton Melville and Carlon Mentoor, lives off what those two break open.

The penalty corner as a weapon

On the penalty corner Mustapha Cassiem is the first option, with his late drag flick and a slip variant that nudges the ball just sideways at the stop to wrong-foot the first runner. Calvin Davis is the alternative, a taker of hard, low sweep hits who also finishes off rebounds; it was he who, in the 3-3 against Ireland, buried the penalty corner that briefly put South Africa ahead.

And right there lies the vulnerability. That same match showed that South Africa does not always see a lead through to the end: with less than three minutes to go it was 3-2, and yet it became 3-3. "As fast as we scored, we also conceded", Van der Merwe admitted, pointing his side towards holding on to games and defending penalty corners. Add to that the discipline, which wobbled again in the Nations Cup final with cards at the wrong moment, and the dependence on a fit Mustapha, and the realistic picture emerges. Against the drag flick arsenals of Australia and Spain that can go badly: the 12-0 that Australia inflicted on South Africa in 2010, still the biggest win ever at a men's World Cup, is the scar that explains why this team stays humble.

Australia: the favourite that rules the pool

The Kookaburras, world number three and three-time world champions, are the clear pool winners in waiting. Under coach Mark Hager Australia is building a new generation around a deep arsenal of drag flickers, with a game intensity South Africa never meets at home. For the side this is the match where the structural gap is widest, and where the scar of the 12-0 from 2010 inevitably plays a part. Realistically this duel is not about the win but about staying worthy and limiting the damage.

Spain: dangerous and used to the top

The Red Sticks, qualified via the Pro League, are the side that makes the difference between going through and dropping out. Spain beat Australia this year and pushed Belgium to the limit, and is exactly the kind of opponent, technical and structured, that South Africa struggles against. A point or more against Spain would tip the AmaStokke's tournament; losing means almost certainly another early exit.

Ireland: the most attainable clash

Ireland, world number nine, is closest to South Africa in level, as the 3-3 at the Nations Cup showed. This is the match where South Africa can realistically pull off a surprise and turn its chances of going through. But Ireland did not climb to ninth place for nothing: in Cape Town the equaliser came only in the closing minutes, a reminder of the Irish fighting spirit that South Africa must this time put to bed.

Key players per rival

• Australia: Tom Craig, Jacob Anderson and Daniel Beale form the attacking axis; watch the rotating drag flickers in the Australian set-piece.
• Spain: veteran Marc Recasens, playmaker Joan Tarres and goalkeeper Luis Calzado carry the Spanish game.
• Ireland: captain Kyle Marshall, veteran Lee Cole and forward Daragh Walsh, who scored against South Africa at the Nations Cup.

The mentality of this team is captured in a single line from Dayaan Cassiem, spoken when it wasn't even certain whether the squad could afford the indoor World Cup: "At the beginning of the tour, we weren't sure about funding, and we said it doesn't matter about money or anything, we're going to make the country proud". Playing as if the money doesn't matter, precisely because it painfully does, that is the South African keynote.

That resilience is no abstraction. It bears the name Cullin de Jager, who in a packed Hartleyvale stopped all four of New Zealand's penalty shoot-outs and carried his team to the final. It takes the shape of a comeback from 0-2 down against France that tipped the stadium over. And it bears a name the team quietly honoured ahead of the test series against the Netherlands: Cassa Cassiem, the father of Dayaan and Mustapha, "a gentle giant" who passed away in December 2025 and whose legacy lives on in his sons. Mustapha sums up the driving force succinctly: "I come from a background where you could either go down the right path or the wrong path". Hockey was the right turn, and the gratitude about that is palpable in everything this team does.

Much of that toughness comes from an unexpected corner: the indoor court. It is in indoor hockey, with its small margins and endless shoot-outs, that the Cassiems and De Jager honed their composure, and it is no coincidence that this very team claimed the country's first World Cup medal. De Jager himself is the proof of it, a goalkeeper from a small school who went unnoticed everywhere and worked his way up through the provincial rankings to become the best goalkeeper of an international tournament. This is a squad used to starting with less and delivering anyway, and that habit may well be its greatest weapon at a World Cup.

Hockey in South Africa has historically been a sport of white private schools, and the unification of the federation in 1992 immediately turned transformation into a living, politically charged theme. The Cassiem brothers embody what that can yield: raised in Mitchells Plain on the Cape Flats, sons of a father who under apartheid was never allowed to play for his country, now the face of the national team. Three generations of hockey, from a denied father to two sons who carry the captain's armband and the star role. That story is exceptional precisely because it is so rare: the bulk of the internationals still come from the network of traditional hockey schools, and the road from the Cape Flats to the national team remains the exception rather than the rule.

But the structure in which that happens is creaking. South Africa is a hockey nation without money. For the World Cup 2026 the federation launched public crowdfunding campaigns just to get the men and women to Europe at all, with the simple message that the squad had done the hard work and now needed the country behind it. It is no one-off. For the 2025 junior World Cup, every U21 player had to chip in 40,000 rand out of their own pocket, a shortfall that was discussed all the way up in parliament. Former national coach Garreth Ewing summed it up years earlier already: because of the absence of a main sponsor, "our players constantly fundraising or having to pay out of their own pockets". And even the overarching SASCOC is itself waiting on government money that simply never comes.

The direct consequence is a persistent talent drain. A lack of money pushes young talent towards cricket and rugby, the country's well-professionalised sports. Junior international Jaydon Brooker, top scorer at the Junior Africa Cup, chose a cricket career, in the footsteps of hockey legend-turned-cricketer Jonty Rhodes. Those who do stay in hockey sooner or later seek the pro route to Germany, Belgium or the Netherlands; the Cassiems do so at AH&BC Amsterdam. That the Nations Cup opener coincided with the World Cup start of rich little football brother Bafana Bafana, and Hartleyvale still sold out, says something about how deep the passion runs despite everything.

Wavre as home base

South Africa plays its pool in the brand-new Belfius Hockey Arena in Wavre, on Belgian soil. The World Cup runs from 15 to 30 August 2026, split across Wavre and the Wagener Stadion in Amstelveen. For South Africa, a draw in Wavre means it stands straight away against the world's elite, without the soft landing of a pool with a weaker sibling. It is a familiar role: as the lowest-ranked side the team travels with nothing to lose and everything to prove, exactly the mentality in which this team feels most at home.

Pool C and the tournament format

The draw was as tough as it could possibly fall: Australia, Spain, Ireland and South Africa in a pool in which South Africa is the lowest-ranked side. Sixteen nations are split across four pools of four; the best two per pool advance to the intermediate round, after which two pools of four produce the semi-finalists.

Scenario analysis: the road to the final

Realistically the whole tournament for South Africa revolves around second place. Australia is the quasi-certain group winner, so the second qualifying spot becomes a fight with Spain and Ireland. Ireland is the most attainable scalp, given the 3-3 in Cape Town. If South Africa takes that match and steals a point or a win against Spain, then for the first time in history a place beyond the group stage opens up. Every goal counts in this: with equal points, goal difference decides second place, and a heavy defeat against Australia could prove costly to South Africa precisely there. Lose to both Spain and Ireland, and an early exit looms once again, and on an unlucky day against Australia even a painful thrashing.

1. The fitness of Mustapha Cassiem. The first thing you check is whether he's playing. His ankle injury from the Nations Cup makes his presence the biggest variable in the whole South African tournament; with him the team is an outsider with teeth, without him a brave experiment.

2. The Cassiem connection in transition. Follow the spine the moment South Africa wins the ball: Mustapha seeks space upright, Dayaan sprints diagonally behind the defence. The lightning pass from one into the run of the other is this team's hallmark.

3. Mustapha's late drag flick. On the penalty corner, watch his wrist movement; it comes so late that the goalkeeper commits too early. And watch the stopper: if he nudges the ball subtly aside, the slip variant is on.

4. Cullin de Jager at shoot-outs. If it comes down to penalty shoot-outs, South Africa holds the advantage. De Jager is also the country's indoor goalkeeper and faces shoot-outs week in, week out; against New Zealand he stopped all four.

5. Kenton Melville in front of goal. The young finisher scored four goals in four matches at the Nations Cup when the stars dropped out. Watch his positioning right in front of the goalkeeper.

6. Sam Mvimbi's backhand. His goal that pulled them within reach in the final came via a fierce reverse from an impossible angle. Mvimbi scores the kind of goal that reopens a dead match.

7. The second and third quarters. South Africa wears the opponent down with intensity and then strikes. Whoever keeps pace early should beware around half-time.

8. The closing phase, for the wrong reason. Keep an eye on South Africa when it holds a lead. The team gave away a late lead several times at the Nations Cup; defending matches and penalty corners is the exposed nerve.

9. The first quarter as an energy test. South Africa opens fiercely and tries to make the opponent run early. Whoever wants to know how much the team has in the tank looks at the intensity of the first fifteen minutes; if it drops too fast, it becomes a long afternoon.

10. Dayaan Cassiem's solo run. Watch the moments when the captain gets the ball on his stick with space in front of him. His acceleration and dribble through a compact defence are often the cue for South Africa's most dangerous moment of the match.

Three scenarios are open in Wavre. In the finest one, South Africa survives the group stage for the first time in its history, carried by a fit Mustapha, the saves of De Jager and an Irish scalp. In the likely one, it ends up third in the pool, honourable and with flashes of brilliance, but just short against Spain and Ireland. In the painful one, it ends in a thrashing by Australia that reopens the old wound of 2010. By the time of the men's final on Sunday 30 August in Wavre, South Africa will long have been watching from the sidelines.

But the measure of this team lies not only in the result. A federation that has to crowdfund its players just to travel, and that watches its talent leak away to cricket and rugby, still stands here with the African crown, an indoor World Cup medal and home silver in its pocket. No other African nation comes close, and few countries in the world achieve so much with so little. Whether the Cassiems truly carry South Africa hinges on a single thing: a fit Mustapha. But the summer of Cape Town also proved the opposite of dependence, namely that this team, when it has to, can battle its way to a final even without its stars. Therein lies the true legacy of a father who was never allowed to play: a side that keeps showing up, however lopsided the odds, and that walks off the pitch with more pride than its place on the rankings would suggest.

Official sources

• International Hockey Federation (FIH) - rankings, World Cup 2026, Nations Cup.
• African Hockey Federation - AFCON, qualification, Nations Cup.
• South African Hockey Association - selection, staff, match reports.
• Olympics.com - World Cup records and Paris 2024.
• the official World Cup schedule.

South African media

• Daily Maverick - quality press and analysis.
• Times LIVE - match reports.
• Eyewitness News - news and match reports.
• SABC Sport - national broadcaster.
• The Athlete - Cassiem portraits.
• News24 - sports news.