We can build a better team for Afcon
On leading South African U20 to the AFCON qualifiers in September
This is a massive task that comes with a lot of responsibilities; guiding all these talented players is an honour. But it also needs a lot of hard work, honesty and commitment. Our goal is to qualify for the next Afcon tournament and if we prepare ourselves adequately, we can be able to do it, I have no doubt about that. In the past I have worked with youth players at provincial level where I coached U19, U17 and U15. So, when I was told that I have been given this task to coach our national U20 team, I knew that I have enough experience to draw from. This is something that I have done before. I also understand the general behaviour of this age group and the expectations which come with the job. Yes, it’s going to be a challenge but if you really have a passion to coach and you enjoy working with the youth, it shouldn’t be a problem. And these days there is not a lot of difference between coaching a senior team and the national U20 team. When you are talking about U20 players, you are talking about players who should be already playing at the highest level. We have players (like Shandre Campbell and Luke Bartman) who are already playing in the DStv Premiership and are also part of this age group. In other countries, even U17 players are already playing for their respective senior teams. So, that tells you that there is not a lot of gap. But the only challenge we have, especially in Africa, is that a player can move all the way to senior national team without representing junior national teams. An ideal situation is to start exposing players to international football from junior national team before they can eventually graduate to the U20, U23 and senior national team. The graduation process works well because it gives players an opportunity to start playing international football at an early age and that will then create a longer life span. If a player starts playing professional football at the age of 24, purely based on natural talent then the playing span become a bit shorter. That is where we face challenges as Africans, in particular South Africa.
On appointing Reneilwe Letsholonyane, Karabo Mogudi and Donald Mojaki to the technical team
Yeye (Letsholonyane) brings a lot of experience having played the game in the PSL and the senior national team. He also took the route of becoming a qualified coach by attending coaching courses. Karabo is a qualified coach who works at the University of Johannesburg and has experience working with the youth and Don as well. So, we have a very good mixture of coaches who have played the game and worked with the youth. We are currently in a weeklong training camp with 41 players, and I honestly believe that this has been a fruitful camp. We were able to watch the players closer. We know some of them because they play in the DStv Premiership. We have a group of players who are matured, understand the tactics and what we require from them as coaches. We know that they are technically good, and they can quickly adjust to how we want them to play going to the U20 Afcon qualifiers in September. Having this camp was a very good idea. We also gave them a number of games to play so that we can see exactly the right personnel that will represent us going forward. Obviously, there are some of individual aspects of their game where we think they need to improve. And we have discussed this with them.
On the Afcon qualifiers in September
Everything we are doing now is working towards getting this team ready for September when the Afcon qualifiers begin. In terms of the proposed programme, if things go our way, we will have another mini-training camp in June. And maybe we will have two more camps leading up to the competition, which I think will give us enough time to prepare and deal with a number of issues. This was the first camp we had, and we wanted to start with local players before we can invite overseas-based players. We already have some of the names of players who are playing abroad. And with the plan that we have with the Technical Director [Walter Steenbook], I think and hopefully, we will be able to get three overseas-based players into our team. Obviously, we are not going to physically follow their progress, but we have a number of methods that we use to scout them. And with improved technology, we can see some of their matches. That is what we do to ensure that we gather information on them.
On South Africa failing to qualify for the last two editions (2021 and 2023) of U20 Afcon
There might be a number of things which led to us failing to qualify for the last two tournaments. But in order to improve, the most important thing that we look at is the number of camps, do we have one or two camps before you go. Most challenges will come if you only have a team for a week before the tournament. If you have two or maybe three camps, then you can justify that you have had enough time to prepare. And that is what is happening now because we believe we can make a better team.
On drawing from past experience of coaching in Africa
Personally, I have learned a lot from coaching on the continent, especially from last year’s CAF Confederation Cup. The most important thing, which can decide whether a team is successful or not, is how you adjust to different environments. The weather, the style of play, physical attributes of African players and the type of football that they play. All the teams play differently, and the conditions are also different. So, we have to adjust, that is the only thing that is going to help us.