Mpote and co. are the present, but where is the future?
Mogomotsi ‘Teenage’ Mpote will return to the Zebras bench when the side faces Eritrea next month. Mpote represents a crop of seasoned coaches who are the present, but where does the future lie, asks Staff Writer
The Botswana Football Association (BFA) has turned to Mpote to lead the Zebras against the continent’s lowest-ranked nation, Eritrea, in an Africa Cup of Nations preliminary round tie. Mpote has been in the seat before and enjoyed relative success after he led the side to their second COSAFA Cup final appearance in 2019.
There was the late David Bright before Mpote, but Stanley Tshosane was the first coach to lead the Zebras to a historic AFCON finals appearance in 2012. Letang ‘Rasta’ Kgengwenyane also had a taste of the Zebras bench when he led the team at last year’s COSAFA Cup.
Otherwise, the BFA has always looked to the West for candidates to coach the national team. Most teams in Africa have trodden this path. Senegal recently made the continent sit up and take notice when they persisted with a former national team player, Aliou Cisse who eventually landed the nation’s golden moment. He recently led the Teranga Lions to the first ever AFCON title. Cisse has been in the job since 2015 when he was only 39. Despite turbulent moments, the Senegal
Football Federation stuck with the former national team captain.
Six years after his appointment, Cisse celebrated the country’s finest moment when Senegal lifted the AFCON trophy on February 6. It is a path that could appeal to the BFA, an association that has failed to find consistency on the Zebras bench.
Today it’s Tshosane, tomorrow it’s Peter Butler, then the late Bright, Mpote and Kgengwenyane. It is proof of the unstable nature of the job and perhaps impatience on the part of the football administrators.
Senegal and Cisse have served a timely reminder that patience could pay the required dividends. While the BFA has given Mpote the reigns, the coach represents an outgoing breed with most employers now looking for a fresh injection of youth and vim. Extension Gunners have been the boldest of the 16team Botswana Premier League assembly.
They have handed a 31-year-old Wame Mokoke, popularly known as ‘Pepezino’ the power to drive forward the future of one of the biggest local football brands. At 26, Mokoke was already in charge of Mahalapye United Hotspurs and has sat on the bench of former Premier League side, Molepolole City Stars.
This means he has gained considerable experience in football in the shortest possible time. His value has risen significantly as he crafts a beautiful story at Gunners. Then there is Pontsho Moloi, who at 40, is considerably older, but fits the bill of young coaches expected to be the torchbearers in the not-too-distant future.
Moloi has been in the game for five years since he decided to hang up his boots in 2016. The young lions coming up through the coaching ranks might force BFA’s hand sooner than later.