Football saved Jayden Adams from the tough life, but in the end just not enough

Jayden Adams was well on his way to being an African football star.

The skilful central midfielder who possessed muscle, a pass and vision won the Caf Champions League with Mamelodi Sundowns in May. He played the full 90 minutes of the 1-0 opening leg win against FAR Rabat in Pretoria, then 53 of the 1-1 draw in Morocco before being substituted.

That capped a fine second-half recovery in form in the 2025-26 domestic season. He had drifted out of favour amid injuries and apparently a loss of concentration in the opening half of the campaign, costing him his place in the Bafana Bafana squad at the Africa Cup of Nations (Afcon) in Morocco, where they exited in the last 16 to Cameroon on penalties.

After the Champions League glory, the 2026 Fifa World Cup and a crowning achievement of playing on the greatest stage beckoned for the 25-year-old.

He started the 2-0 defeat against Mexico at Estadio Azteca in the tournament opener and had a good performance softening up Czechia and paving the way for the playmaker who replaced him, Relebohile Mofokeng, to shine off the bench in the 1-1 draw in Atlanta.

Bafana coach Hugo Broos bravely started 21-year-old talent Mofokeng to great effect in the 1-0 win against South Korea in Monterrey, with Adams playing his part in tying the game up replacing the Orlando Pirates player in the 80^th minute. He did not have a role to play in the last-gasp 1-0 last-32 defeat to Canada in Los Angeles.

Adams’s grandmother, Marianna Adams, had died just before the Czechia game and he played on while mourning. “My legs were playing, but my heart was in heaven with her,” the player said then.

Returning home, there seemed no sign of the shock and tragedy that was to follow. Adams was found dead, apparently in a hotel/self-catering apartment block in Schotschekloof, the historic Cape Malay neighbourhood in the city centre known for its colourful houses, on Saturday.

Details of his death remain sketchy. Cape Town police have opened an inquest, though the prevailing information has pointed to him taking his own life, which has not been confirmed officially.

TimesLIVE has established an SMS or WhatsApp message was sent to the family regarding suicide. Adams’s father rushed across the city from their home in Idas Valley, Stellenbosch, and had to break down a bathroom door on arrival only to find his son had passed.

Adams seemed smiley and happy-go-lucky. He was also, internally and sometimes it showed outwardly, drawn to a dark side, as many young men can be and especially those from tough backgrounds.

A video produced by Adams’s representatives when he was at Stellies, Forwardzone, provides some idea of his rise from Idas Valley, where father Juanito was a lifelong Kaizer Chiefs and Liverpool fan. The midfielder’s journey took him from starting to play at five, through Ajax Cape Town’s development, Stellenbosch’s reserves and being an emerging star in the Premiership.

Having grown up in and alongside the life of the gun, Adams was apparently drawn towards the path so many of his friends took, one so common in Cape Town’s tough neighbourhoods.

Adams had close family members who had been gangsters. Plenty of his school friends chose that path. And the path of the bottle too. Idas Valley is by accounts not the toughest neighbourhood in Cape Town but not easy living either. The same apparently could be said of Adams’s upbringing.

In November 2024 he was expelled from the Bafana camp for a late arrival while still a Stellies player and the young midfielder spent some time in the cold. His move to Downs and quality performances there saw Broos, who seemed not just to have admiration for Adams’s talent but also a soft spot for the player and desire to help him find the right path, bring him back.

His tragic death so soon after the World Cup has made international headlines. There was a moment of silence ahead of England’s 2-1 quarterfinal win against Norway at Miami Stadium on Saturday. England attacking midfield star Jude Bellingham and South African rapper Nasty C have talked of men’s mental health and the emotional pressures faced by professional athletes.

Stellies are mourning the death of another of their sons. In a further indication of the pressures for young footballers of growing up around violence in the city, South Africa under-20 captain Oshwin Andries died after being stabbed in a tavern in Cape Town in February 2023. DStv Diski Challenge (under-23 league) player Jeandre Gaffoor, 20, drowned in De Villiers Dam while hiking the Constantia Nek trail in February.