Pitso inspired me, says Kaitano
GAMES
SuperSport United coach Kaitano Tembo has revealed how Pitso Mosimane’s passion inspired him and how the Mamelodi Sundowns mentor pushed him towards a coaching career.
Tembo played under Mosimane at Matsatsantsa a Pitori and that’s where the mentorship started.
Tembo said the day he saw Mosimane crying while he was an assistant at SuperSport, because he wanted the team to continue with training after they had been disturbed, he knew he (Mosimane) was destined for great things.
“He didn’t care who was seeing him. That’s how passionate he is,” Tembo told a South African Football Journalists (Safja) media conference this week.
“He inspired me. He is ambitious and he is one coach who always wants to win and would do anything to get what he wants. He is extremely hard working and taught me how to analyse matches when I was still playing. He would call me and say ‘go and watch that match and report on that game, I need you to look out for one, two, three, four…’
“That’s how I learned to analyse the games. It made it easy for me to relay the message to the other players because he and (the late) Thomas Madigage would come to my place to talk football.
They played a huge role in me becoming a coach. They started preparing me while I was still playing,” said Tembo.
The 49-year-old mentor said he understood why some people have misguided views on Mosimane. “He is one person I will always support. He is misunderstood at times because he is ambitious and wants to achieve big things. I’m not surprised where he is now because I saw it coming.
“I remember when he was an assistant coach to Bruce (Grobbelaar) and the managers took a long time to come. We had already started training but after they addressed us, Bruce wanted to cancel training.
“Pitso cried there and then and insisted we continue training.”