DOHA, June 26, Harry Kane’s costly miss against Ghana has thrust one of football’s strangest tales back into the spotlight, after a Ghanaian witch doctor claimed he had cast a spell over England’s captain before dramatically declaring the curse lifted.
The bizarre episode has also revived memories of Australian football’s extraordinary entanglement with the supernatural, a saga spanning more than five decades and featuring not one but two witch doctor interventions that became woven into Socceroos folklore.
Following England’s goalless draw with Ghana this week, Ghanaian spiritualist Nana Kwaku Bonsam declared his work complete.
“Now I am going to release Harry Kane so that, his next match, he can score,” Bonsam said. “Harry, I will come and visit you. Don’t be offended. We are friends.”
The self described spiritualist had earlier claimed he cast a spell over the England captain, who squandered a golden opportunity late in the match. Kane admitted afterwards he was left frustrated by the miss.
“I was waiting for an opportunity like that to fall my way,” Kane said. “It did and I just couldn’t quite get over the ball. But I’ve been a striker long enough to know they don’t always go in.”
The curse that haunted Australian football
While many dismissed Bonsam’s claims as colourful folklore, Australia’s football history offers a far deeper connection to the supernatural, one that became the sport’s most enduring conspiracy theory.
The story dates back to November 1969, when the Socceroos travelled to Mozambique to face Rhodesia, now Zimbabwe, in a World Cup qualifier. Australia entered the series as overwhelming favourites but could only manage two draws, forcing a deciding third match.
According to legend, a local journalist suggested several Australian players seek help from a traditional Mozambique witch doctor, known locally as a nyunga. The medicine man reportedly buried bones beneath one of the goalposts before placing a curse on Rhodesia, particularly targeting goalkeeper Robin Jordan. Australia won the deciding match 3-1 after Jordan was injured in a collision with Ray Baartz.
The celebration did not last long. The nyunga demanded $1,000 for his services and, when the Australians either refused or could not pay, allegedly reversed the curse onto Australian football.
Former Socceroos captain Johnny Warren became the curse’s most famous believer. He spent decades insisting the unpaid debt explained Australia’s heartbreaking failures to qualify for the World Cup, including the infamous 1997 collapse against Iran at the MCG.
“When Australia played Iran at the MCG that night, which Australians will not forget, that was Australia’s game and we didn’t win it for some reason, that’s the witch doctor,” Warren said. “Every time you see those things you think, ‘Ah, the curse is still there’.”
Safran’s ritual and the 2006 breakthrough
The curse became so ingrained in Australian football folklore that television personality John Safran travelled to Mozambique in 2004 while filming John Safran vs God in an attempt to remove it. The original witch doctor had died, but Safran found another spiritual healer who claimed he could communicate with him.
The ritual involved returning to the same stadium where Australia had played Rhodesia before completing a second ceremony with Warren at Sydney’s Olympic Stadium.
“That involved us sitting in the middle of the pitch and he killed a chicken and splattered the blood all over me,” Safran recalled. “I then had to go to Telstra Stadium with Johnny and we had to wash ourselves in some clay the witchdoctor had given us.”
Almost exactly one year after Warren’s death in 2004, Australia finally ended its 32 year World Cup drought by defeating Uruguay in a dramatic penalty shootout to qualify for Germany 2006. SBS commentator Craig Foster jokingly thanked Safran during the post match broadcast for lifting the curse.
Peruvian shamans fail to stop Socceroos
Australian football’s brushes with witchcraft did not end there. Ahead of the Socceroos’ World Cup playoff against Peru in 2022, 13 Peruvian shamans gathered in Lima to perform a ceremony aimed at ensuring their nation reached Qatar.
The shamans blew a traditional pututo horn towards a photograph of the Australian team before repeatedly stabbing the image with swords while consuming ayahuasca as part of the ritual. Lead shaman Walter Alarcon confidently predicted the outcome.
“We have carried out a Peruvian victory ceremony. We have summoned all the shamans at a national level,” he said. “There are 13 shamans because Peru plays Australia on the 13 June, and we have foreseen Peru passing to the next round. Peru will be in Qatar for the World Cup because we have seen people’s joy, after taking ayahuasca plants.”
The prediction proved spectacularly wrong. Australia defeated Peru in a penalty shootout, with Andrew Redmayne’s famous ‘Grey Wiggle’ heroics sending the Socceroos to Qatar despite the elaborate ceremony designed to stop them.
