KING KILAMBE
ZZambianbi fforwardd R Rotsont KilKilambeb spentt ffour years playingli iin ththe SSouthth AfAfricani PPremieri SSoccer LeagueL and although not the most prolific of forwards, he had a knack of coming up with crucial goals. Injuries hampered his spells with Mamelodi Sundowns, Bloemfontein Celtic and Kaizer Chiefs, and he ended with 16 goals in 60 starts across those teams, but many of them were memorable.
Rotson Kilambe was not the most feared forward, but he came up with two winners in cup finals and scored a number of other crucial goals. Having joined Mamelodi Sundowns prior to the start of the 2003/04 season, Kilambe arrived from top Zambian side Zanaco after having previously been with Yunnan Hongta in China and boyhood club Power Dynamos. With The Brazilians his debut goal was against Bloemfontein Celtic, who he would join after two years at Chloorkop, and scored the solitary goal that won Celtic the 2005 SAA Supa8 against SuperSport United in Potchefstroom.
Kilambe then scored against
Kaizer Chiefs that season and Amakhosi went on to become his next club, where he again slammed the winning goal in the Supa8 final the next year. “I always felt I just had to do my job for whoever my employer was at the time,” Kilambe chuckles. “If my employer was happy with my contribution, it meant I had done what I was hired to do, which was to score goals. Scoring goals against teams that I would then go on to play for defined my career in the PSL. “I didn’t plan for it to happen that way, but that’s how it turned out in the end.” Unfortunately, Kilambe had his contract terminated during the 2007 off-season after he was deemed excess to requirements following an injury-ravaged nine month spell at Naturena.
His departure was shrouded in
controversy as despite offloading him, Chiefs still insisted on a US$100 000 transfer fee should any club from abroad be keen on him. He then found his way back to boyhood club Power Dynamos. With joints bruised and battered from all the tackles he dealt with through his playing days, Kilambe retired at the end of 2008, playing his last match at Arthur Davies Stadium – a stone’s throw from where he grew up. Now 38, Kilambe is in charge at Zambian second tier league club Mining Rangers who are also from his hometown in the Copperbelt Province. “After retiring, I immediately began getting my coaching badges, starting with the KVNB badges, then CAF C licence, B licence and now I am waiting for the CAF A licence, which l will do in December. “I went into coaching because I have been in football all my life and I want to stay in the game. I know very well that it is not every former footballer that can become a good coach. I went into coaching because I believe I can make a difference.
“When I retired, adjusting from
being a hero-worshipped player to being an ordinary guy on the streets was really difficult. My wife actually wanted me to stop everything to do with football and start a business, but I felt I still wanted to be part of this game,” he says. “I started a small business after I retired but I then decided to stop it because of financial problems. I am now in football full-time.
“I KNOW VERY WELL THAT IT IS NOT EVERY FORMER FOOTBALLER THAT CAN BECOME A GOOD COACH.”
“Life is not the same anymore. When I was playing I used to get a salary plus match bonuses, but now I am just getting a salary. “For those guys who are not doing well now, maybe they were not saving the money when they were playing, but for me at least I am still here, surviving. I have managed to maintain my lifestyle, I didn’t drop from the sky all the way down to the ground. “I still manage to feed my family, and my kids are all going to school. That is what gives me the most happiness, as that’s what I was working for.”
Like plenty who played in years
gone by, Kilambe doesn’t mince his words about the modern game, which enjoys huge financial backing. “During our time the money was not as good as it is now. We played with more passion than the current generation, who are only driven by money and rarely put in 100 percent effort,” he says. “The standard of football has dropped because players are not putting in their best efforts. Considering the kind of money that is now in football, I feel the players should also up their efforts. These players must really be doing better now with this kind of money. “I also hope they realise that they have to save as much money as possible because the truth about this game is that they will not be playing forever. Life in retirement can be rough if you didn’t save enough while playing. “If you don’t want to die a pauper, you have to save while you are still playing.”