With the break, let’s see if Benni continues streak

So far I am impressed by Benni McCarthy’s start to his coaching career. He has beaten one of the best coaches in the country – Gavin Hunt – twice. Wits are the defending champions of both the Absa Premiership and the MTN8. It is something that is going to make the second-leg of the MTN8 semifinal very interesting. We saw how Bidvest Wits applied themselves to try and win the game away.

We need to see how Benni will keep the momentum going now that the Fifa break is upon us. We have seen in the past that teams are doing very well, then comes the Fifa break and they go on a break, which ends up killing their momentum.

When they return, they normally struggle and then the underdogs get an opportunity to rise to the occasion.

I will be waiting with great anticipation to see how Benni will manage his Cape Town City side in this regard.

This will also apply to Maritzburg United coach Fadlu Davids. Although Faldu is slightly more experienced than Benni, it remains that if you are a young and a new coach you need all the support from the management and we are now starting to see that, because the results are showing and the players are responding positively to his philosophy, which is something that usually takes time.

What Fadlu needs to do now is keep his young players grounded, and how does he do that? The club needs to have management programmes outside of football that deal with the players’ behaviour, financial management and healthy lifestyles.

These are the programmes that will help the players enhance and nurture their talent and improve their football forward. This will also lead to player intelligence on and off the pitch and help them with their discipline.

Our players are not exposed to these programmes, and as such it will be easy for them to abuse and misuse their footballer status – it will be easy for their performances to drop and to shift their focus into a negative pattern.

But if the clubs implement these aforementioned programmes, the players will always be guided on how to live a healthy lifestyle and conduct themselves professionally.

If these programmes are implemented adequately, these young players will always stand a good chance to succeed on and off the pitch.

I would also like to touch on the case of Rivaldo Coetzee. It is sad that his move to Scottish side Celtic fell through after he failed his medical examination due to a foot injury. It is the worst-kept secret that his heart is no longer at Ajax Cape Town. But now he has to go back and play for the team. This is then when professionalism has to come into play.

Football is a game of emotions and for me I believe that if the relationship is broken down to a point whereby it becomes difficult that it can be rebuilt, I think it is best to grant the player his wish and he should join the club of his choice or the club that are interested in him because it will be difficult for him to go back and play.

We need to examine the extent of the injury so that we know how long it will take to heal. We know that teams overseas are cautious about taking risks in signing players who are injured, but here at home it might be treated differently. If they see his injury can be cured in a short period of time, they could still buy him.