During the early 2000s Orlando Pirates had one of the best youth structures in South Africa. We saw the likes of Gift Leremi, Lebohang Mokoena and Joseph Makhanya rising from their development side. It is not every player who can take the league by storm during their debut season but the trio comfortably did so.

Giving Mokoena and Makhanya the respect they both deserve, Gift Leremi was the cream of the crop. Leremi was the kind of player we would have loved to see on big stages such as the FIFA World Cup in 2010, an event where he would have excelled in, showing the world how much talent we have in South Africa. Only a few defenders in the tournament would have been able to tame him and Teko Modise in that showpiece as they would have produced magical performances.

Life is always not so far, death took Gift Leremi soon, all we have now are memories. We would have loved to see Leremi passing the torch to his son with the aim of following in his footsteps but he have since learned that he has a daughter who is known. Her daughter may still take the footballing world by storm but it is known if her focus will be in football.

At the time of his passing Gift Leremi was married to Mamello, the mother of his daughter. We take a look at more beautiful pictures of Gift Leremi’s family.