09 Jun 2024

Former South Africa’s Kaizer Chiefs and Banana Bafana player, Bernard Parker has chosen Botswana as a launch pad for his book titled, From A Shack To Destiny.

Over and above the book launch on Thursday, Parker conducted some coaching clinics in the country he described as close to his heart.

In one of the chapters, Parker noted that he excelled in a number of sporting codes, from long jump to long distance running, the main being athletics,

Despite being a tiny, he also tried shot put, through which he managed to make it to the Eastern Gauteng competition in long distance running.

An all-rounder, Parker, also did swimming and made it to the nationals for breast stroke, in all this soccer always came first, but the only challenge, he said was that her mother could not afford to buy him soccer boots, let alone school shoes.However things started to change for the better when he befriended his teacher, Denzil Bezuidenhout’s son.

“The teacher liked my good manners and he welcomed me to into his house. Sometimes I would do sleepovers and sometimes I would go to their house just for food. We were really struggled financially at home,” he said.

Bezuidenhout bought his son a new pair of soccer boots, and his son Beuron gave me his old pair and it was his first pair, After being included in the Eastern Gauteng team Parker said he travelled a lot with under 10’s, 12’and 13’s.

Parker attended the school of excellence trials and he passed, but as fate would have it when his father and mother were no longer together, his aunt advised them to relocate.

They then moved to bluebell Street Reigerpark, where they put their two room shack .

However Parker started his professional football at Thanda Royal Zulu, before joining Serbian team Red Star Belgrade. He then went to Eredisvile Side FC Twente which loaned him to Panserraikos in the Greek Super League.

He also played for teams such as Leicester City, and Kaizer Chiefs, and is currently playing for TS Galaxy. ENDS