Concern over lack of women mentors
Men hogs Sasol League champs’ coaching jobs
Despite the tournament being about developing women’s football, the Sasol League National Championships have only two women as head coaches.
Out of all the contesting nine clubs, Rhulani Mathebula of Limpopo outfit Kanatla and Mmeza Gaborone of Northern Cape side RC Mills are the only female mentors at the tournament, which concludes at the Kabokweni Stadium in Mpumalanga tomorrow.
However, as much as the South African Football Association (Safa) is concerned about the scarcity of women coaches at the six-day competition, the local football governing body insists the situation is not a true reflection of the percentage of female coaches in the Sasol League.
“We are concerned [about the shortage of female coaches in the tournament] ... it is one of our priorities to develop women coaches,” head of competitions at Safa, Thomas Sadiki, said.
“Next year the situation will be better but what you see here is not exactly that there are no women coaches for women teams because it is only nine teams here and we have 154 teams all over the country,” he said.
Sadiki also revealed that Safa was in the process of implementing a rule that will compel all the 154 clubs to have female assistants, at least if the head coach is a male.
Sasol’s group marketing manager Nozipho Mbatha also weighed in: “We want to see women coaches, and we are working with Safa to do better in that aspect.”