This is what’s wrong with KZN soccer
IN NINETEEN PSL seasons this province has witnessed 11 relegations involving six clubs, of which two have disappeared from the professional ranks.
At the weekend AmaZulu suffered their fourth demotion since the PSL era kicked off, in 1996/7.
Last season Lamontville Golden Arrows were relegated. They worked their way back up this term, seemingly to fill the void left by AmaZulu’s departure.
It is almost as if Durban teams are trading places as they did during the late nineties and the turn of the millennium, when AmaZulu and African Wanderers often replaced each other in the top flight. That constant promotion and relegation in alternate seasons earned them the tag of “yo-yo clubs”.
What is wrong with local teams? Is it a question of talent – both playing and coaching? Have our sides struggled to adapt to the increasing demands of professionalism?
It’s definitely nothing to do with talent, according to Durban-born former Bafana Bafana captain Neil Tovey.
“AmaZulu have a lot of good things in place, so for the talent that comes out of this province it shouldn’t happen,” said Tovey, who had two spells as AmaZulu’s coach.
The main problem is poor football administration, says Afzal Khan, who helped Manning Rangers to the league title before enjoying spells at Santos, Mamelodi Sundowns and Maritzburg United.
Khan said that apart from the lack of ambition to challenge bigger clubs, poor retention of players and coaches, and the failure to set up modern development programmes, most KZN sides lacked experience in administration.
“AmaZulu are a typical example. Every coach who has been axed has had a free hand to recruit and sign players. Coaches can be influenced by agents, so everything can’t be vested in the coach.
“AmaZulu are generally well run with good resources and facilities, a strong financial department and sponsor, one of the best playing and training fields, and they meet all their commitments. But there’s an obvious lack of management. This is a consistent problem over the past five years,” said Khan.
He added that football clubs needed a specialist sports director.
“Clubs need a director of football to handle the youth development, coaching staff, signing of players’ contracts, scouting and recruitment of players, all so that the coach only needs to focus on coaching and getting the team to play a good brand of football.
“Our local clubs have youth development, but it’s just a showcase. They don’t have housing for the players or fulltime coaches in place. AmaZulu and Arrows youth play in the local Durban FA in which I’m involved, and they should be sweeping everything, but they don’t.
“They should see how Ajax, Wits, SuperSport do their development and set a small budget for it. Unlike some European leagues our clubs get an equal share of the TV money, so they should be able to do it.”
The lack of leadership led to coaches being chopped and changed, which had a ripple effect on the team, Khan said.
Tovey concurred, saying the high turnover of players and coaches did not allow a team to become stable and grow, and made it difficult for younger players to come through.
Although the current AmaZulu management has been in charge since 2006/7 and has suffered their first relegation, they have gone through a succession of coaching changes including Tovey, Manqoba Mngqithi, Roger Palmgren, Julio Cesar Leal, Craig Rosslee, Ted Dumitru, Clive Barker, Wilfred Mugeyi and incumbent Steve Barker.
During Arrows’ decline they went through a similar pattern with Muhsin Ertugral, Ernst Middendorp, Zoran Filipovic, Mngqithi, and Mark Harrison at the helm, before Shaun Bartlett went down with the side as caretaker coach and bounced back up recently in his first season as head coach.