Soldier at the snooker table
Although the Seshego-born, Mafedi "StaJones" Maloba, first love was soccer, his marriage with the famed beautiful game has being replaced by snooker.
SESHEGO – IT will be a futile exercise to attempt to divorce Mafedi “StaJones” Maloba from the game of snooker.
Although the Seshego-born sport fanatic’s first love was soccer, his marriage with the famed beautiful game has being replaced by snooker.
The fifth of six children, Maloba (47) was born in the third house section of Seshego zone 2, where the Maloba brothers first saw the light of the day to worship at the altar of the football pitch.
“Football has always been a part of my family heritage.
“We used to sit around the family table during meals, but instead of indul-ging in the delicacies our mother had prepared, we boys would chat all the way about football as we strategised about any upcoming games,” Maloba says.
The timely retirement from soccer was the culmination of a journey for Maloba, whose sportsmanship, which is calm, tough and ruthlessly effective, had become as classy and composed as the hitting technique that elevated him to legendary status in the game.
He explains the shift from soccer to snooker as a “smooth and natural transition in the life of a sportsman”.
“Football is an intense sport that requires immense physicality.
“In football, age catches up with you sometimes at an early age.
“Most colourful careers in soccer end as a result of injuries,” Maloba says.
“However, snooker is a different ball game. I will definitely play this game even after retiring from my full-time job as a soldier.”
Today, he is an exemplary modern snooker player.
He plays all the shots with a full flourish of the cue and knows only to hit the cue ball.
His breathtaking sharp shooting skills are a force to be reckoned with in the game itself.
A gambler and a buccaneer, the cultured left-hander is a natural modern day player.
Maloba is simultaneously a cheerful throwback to more innocent times, a flap-eared township boy who has had running battles with the police during Apartheid and later becoming a member of the South African National Defence Force.
For this love of the “beer man’s game”, Maloba says his dream is to establish a snooker academy one day.
