Inside South Africa’s super club
The Athletic FC Podcast
The Athletic
4 • 1.2K Ratings
🗓️ 12 June 2025
⏱️ 37 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
What happens when the best clubs in world football collide? We're about to find out in as the Club World Cup kicks off in the USA.
Big names like Lionel Messi, Real Madrid, and Bayern Munich will all be there. But what about the teams you don't know so well?
The Athletic was granted Access All Areas to South Africa's super club: Mamelodi Sundowns, one of the four African teams taking part in the tournament.
Winners of the last eight Premierships, 15 in all, Sundowns are unstoppable.
So what makes up this club, what are their values and who are the names to look out for?
Listen as The Athletic head to South Africa to meet the Sundowns...
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | The Athletic FC Podcast Network. |
| 0:08.7 | Hi there and welcome to the Athletic FC podcast. |
| 0:12.0 | I'm Adam Leventhal and today we're meeting a team that you might not be familiar with. |
| 0:17.5 | But why? |
| 0:19.3 | Because the Club World Cup kicks off on Saturday the 14th of June in the United States. |
| 0:26.5 | 32 teams split into eight groups of four before the knockouts. |
| 0:30.7 | Leonel Messi, Killeen Mbapé, Harry Kane will all be there, plus more star names. |
| 0:36.3 | Just trying to decide the best of the best. |
| 0:39.6 | Before you ask, and it is slightly complicated, there's no Barcelona, Manchester United or |
| 0:44.6 | Cristiana Ronaldo in this one. |
| 0:47.3 | The Club World Cup is the brainchild of the FIFA President Janie Infantino. |
| 0:52.0 | It's got a gold Tiffany trophy, which is very fancy, and it bears Infantino's name twice. |
| 0:57.8 | What's in it for the clubs? |
| 0:59.5 | I hear you ask. |
| 1:00.2 | Well, there is a $1 billion prize fund, and the winners will get to wear a special badge on their shirt as well. |
| 1:07.2 | What's in it for you? |
| 1:08.1 | Well, you've just got more live football to look forward to this summer. |
| 1:12.1 | And it's all happening in the States ahead of the Real Deal World Cup in 2026. |
| 1:17.6 | It means that there are some new names to get to know, or possibly even support in lieu of your own team not being there. |
| 1:25.8 | And one such team comes from South Africa. They are the |
| 1:28.9 | Mamelodi Sundowns and our writer Simon Hughes went to find out all about them. So great to have |
| 1:35.6 | you with us. So just tell us why are we meeting the sundowns then? Well, they've won the last eight |
... |
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