Growing up in the grinding poverty of the Johannesburg townships before democracy finally reached South Africa, Mokoena used to kick a tennis ball around the dusty streets dreaming of one day becoming a famous footballer.
Little did he know that the skills he honed in Boipatong would set him on a road that would lead to him becoming his country's most capped player and the skipper of Bafana Bafana as South Africa prepares for the first World Cup on African soil.
"It's funny. There are similarities with Portsmouth and South Africa. Nobody is expecting too much," Mokoena, who like many of the hard-up club's multi-national squad is up for sale, told Reuters at the club's training ground this week.
"But I love challenges. I believe that you can overcome anything. That's the kind of guy I am. I grew up with many challenges and I prefer not to complain, I just stay positive and hope I can spread that through my team mates."
On the pitch the tough-tackling Mokoena is nicknamed 'The Axe'. Off it he is charming and articulate, qualities that make him the ideal ambassador in his high-profile role as captain of the World Cup hosts.
"He just got straight to the point and he said to me that you have to make sure we win," Mokoena said.
"I had a tough upbringing and grew up quickly," said Mokoena, who as an 11-year-old survived the horrors of the 1992 massacre in Boipatong which left dozens of people dead.
"Football allowed me to leave the country at a young age and experience new cultures and experience a different life. It provided me with a different education and made me mentally very strong and single-minded."
"I wanted to use the power of football to make a difference to the lives of young people in South Africa," he said. "The challenge will be to leave a lasting legacy from the World Cup."
"All these years we've known it's coming and now it's so close we can touch it. The excitement is growing," he said.
