Has Bafana Bafana ever qualified for a World Cup? Subsequently, the SA team also qualified for the 2002 edition in South Korea/Japan and then hosted it in 2010, their last appearance to date. It’s now 24 years since the South African national side Bafana Bafana debuted in the Fifa World Cup – in France in 1998. The World Cup in France came just four years after Bafana Bafana’s readmission to the international stage and just two years after their stunning triumph in the 1996 Africa Cup of Nations. It had been Clive Barker who had inspired Bafana to succeed in the Afcon final win over Tunisia, but by the time the World Cup came around, Frenchman Philippe Troussier was at the helm.