FASL target grassroots

afoot to set up league structures in schools countrywide.
FASL have lined up coaching courses this year to increase awareness of the game in the schools system and will hold the first Level One course at Allan Wilson High School in Harare starting today.
The course, which runs for six days, is open to anyone but the chief targets are primary and secondary school teachers from Harare.
FASL director for development and training, Frank Farakezi, said the league will engage the Ministry of Education, Sports, Arts and Culture as they seek to introduce five-a-side at junior level with the aim to have the game played at the National Youth Games next year.
“We have come to the realisation that sport should be appreciated at a young age hence we are targeting teachers mostly and those involved in grassroots development to attend this course.
“We want to use their influence and it will help to spread the game to young people whom they are constantly in touch with.
“Actually, it’s one of the concepts that came up during the recent course I attended in Egypt where it was realised that we should develop from the grassroots players who specialise in Futsal only.
“We were supposed to prepare a team to play at the Futsal World Cup but we couldn’t because of issues beyond our control. But I am happy we are getting things in the right track now.
“Our executive, which happens to be the first to be recognised by Zifa as an affiliate, has targeted secondary and primary schools as the starting point for development.
“We will move to tertiary institutions later on but what we want in the near future is to have properly working league structures in schools,” said Farakezi.
The course will be conducted by Caf Futsal instructors Enoch Mutumha, Eric Aisam and Farakezi.
Zifa technical director Nelson Matongorere and Klaus-Dieter Pagels have been invited as the guest instructors.
The same course will be held in Gweru and will be done in all provinces before the end of the year.
The contents of the course include basic skills and techniques in five-a-side, laws of the game, evolution of Futsal, comparisons of training and management with the XI-a-side version.
Participants will wind up with practical and written exams on Friday and Saturday.
The first course targeting grassroots development was held last year and 26 participants from the Mbare/Hatfield district were equipped with certificates at completion.