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Mark Herman wants SAFA chief Raymond Hack to wake up and smell the coffee after he accused Ian Wright's new football academy of 'raping the country'.

If raping the country means providing the kind of grassroots opportunity for young kids that SAFA is supposed to be doing then yes, Africa Soccer Developments in Cape Town is doing just that.

Under the umbrella of a new club called Cape United FC, English Premier League stars Mart Poom, Julio Arca, Stephen Warnock, Alex Song, Danny Collins and Mamady Sidibe have all invested in a project aimed at developing the best African talent and selling them on to Europe.

But Hack is opposed to the idea, claiming the 40 percent the investors pocket from the first sale of a player, including a 10 percent sell-on clause for all future transfers, is morally wrong.

"You can't go into a country, rape the country, and then run away," Hack told the Daily Mail.

"You are not even putting anything back into that country. I have never heard of this academy and they have certainly not been endorsed by SAFA.

"You cannot have people coming into your country, investing in your talent, even if the intentions are 100 percent good. There is a procedure and a protocol which needs to be followed."

Nitpicky crap. Why are the people who make decisions in football always more concerned about technicalities rather than the greater good of the game? Perhaps the academy should have gone through SAFA first, but to be labelled 'rapists' is quite out of order and frankly, hypocritical.

He continued: "Because you've got money does not mean that you can come in and invest in the country and decide what you're going to take and what you're not going to take."

I'm afraid you can, Mr Hack. It's the way modern football has changed. Perhaps he hasn't noticed, which would explain why South African football is still in the dark ages. Look at the European game and the trend of foreign takeovers, the recent splurges of Real Madrid and Manchester City and the controversial signing of young players by richer bullies making headlines today. Money talks, and while SAFA continue to idly sit on theirs - or more likely pocket it themselves - others have come in and taken their own initiative.

I see nothing wrong with investing further in the development of local talent. In fact, it is something we have been severely lacking in South Africa for far too long. The more talented players we produce, the better for the South African game. And who is Raymond Hack to judge this project, a man who wields all the power in the South African game yet effects so little change? If we didn't know any better about the way soccer is run in this country, we might be fooled by his ramblings.

So what if the investors pocket nearly half of any future sale? Where do you want that money to go? Into SAFA's pocket? Surely Hack wouldn't say that publicly. But the other 60 percent that goes back into the academy will continue the development of more and more players, who will all get the chance to make a career in Europe.

The long-term benefit for South Africa may not be physically apparent, but it will show when we have more top-class players such as Benni McCarthy and Steven Pienaar playing in overseas leagues. Is this not the ultimate goal anyway? To produce more players who can compete on the world stage? I don't know about you, but if it takes foreign money to make that happen it's fine with me.

At the rate SAFA and the regional powers corrupt our local game, I'd rather have a few already-rich foreign footballers profiting from this academy than our own officials, who have no excuses for not opening academies of our own. Show me the balance sheet at SAFA and the bank balances of their officials before citing lack of money as an excuse.

The venture is clearly business orientated but the positives to come from it cannot be ignored. If there were several competing academies in South Africa that were being undermined due to the Cape United School of Soccer Excellence, then Hack may have a valid point. But there aren't.

Raymond Hack therefore has no place in this debate and should focus his attention on complimenting this academy with his own SAFA initiatives rather than bad-mouthing it in the British press.

Mark Herman