adminTalking Football with Cosmas Zulu
TEAMS overlook more important issues when preparing during this period.
All they think when preparing in the off-season is going out of town to resort places away from the public. I am going to line up issues to be addressed before the season kick off.
Medical check up’s
• I remember the other year we lost a very talented player, the late Onias Musana during a pre-season workout.
• HIV/AIDS sessions with counsellors as soccer players are among the most vulnerable personalities who need to go through these sessions.
• Alcohol and drug sessions with experts. Excessive intake of these two can deny your team success and players who don’t lead clean lifestyles do not last long in this game. Good examples of such players are Herbert Dick of How Mine, Innocent Mapuranga of Highlanders FC and Desmond Maringwa of Dynamos FC.
In the 1970s we had players such as Gibson Homela of Zimbabwe Saints, Lawrence Phiri and Tymon Mabaleka of Highlanders and of course the writer of this article who at 63 years of age can still run 24km in weekly workouts.
The other year when I was at Highlanders we had some talented players in our team, we had a friendly game with Asante Kotoko, a team from Ghana. We did not camp for that encounter.
We were beaten, outplayed for pace and aggression, tactically and technically. We had a dinner with them at Holiday Inn after the game.
During the function I saw the Asante Kotoko players standing in one corner, I asked their coach why they were not joining the other guests. He had this say “All the 25 players I brought do not drink alcohol neither do they smoke cigarettes.”
Table manners
• Some players do not know what to do when they get to hotels especially when in the dining room. Guys do not know what to eat first when it’s a buffet. You find the guy picking a bowl of ice cream before the main meal, having some hot soup after the main meal, you will find your players having upset stomachs before the game. They don’t even know which knife to use when having steak or fish dishes.
Feedback session
• A get together party with the whole executive members, supporting staff, technical staff, sponsors and office staff, you will be surprised to hear what the players say about the things they would like to see being done within the organisation. No alcohol at this meeting. Many organisations don’t know that all employees come equipped with a brain at no extra charge.
• I remember in the 1980s when we started to book in the hotels, one night in Harare, I phoned the late Fanuel Ncube in his room, he was the captain and he answered the phone and kept saying “Extension! Extension! ufuna ukukhuluma lobani?
“You cannot put the cart before the horse.”
Back to the Pitch
Speed is one of the key factors in football that results from good physical conditioning. In the course of the match a player has to make 100 to 150 sprints ranging from 10 to 40 metres in length.
The average length is around 20 metres. Indeed for some, speed is the noblest of all skills possessed by footballers.
Players are often forced to sprint to dummy at speed and make decoy runs although seldom in a straight line but still at full speed.
They also have this pace when controlling the ball or shooting at goal. The high speed actions are closely linked to strength and to co-ordination.
A word of advice to the coaches.
You are not training marathon runners but soccer players so give them those runs which are related to a soccer game. Until next week
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