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Ndebele was in German last week accompanied by PSL chairman Twine Phiri under the skills transfer programme arranged by television broadcaster SuperSport and the Bundesliga.
There were also two representatives from Zambia and three from Nigeria and Ndebele yesterday said the tour was “a real eye-opener” as they were charmed by the strides made by the European nation since they implemented reforms just over a decade ago.
The PSL leaders got an insight of how the Bundesliga operate and the benefits that the Germany national team is reaping from the football reforms and general organisation at club level.
As part of the tour they also visited Borussia Mönchengladbach’s facilities and their academy and watched Bundesliga matches featuring Borussia Mönchengladbach against FSV Mainz and Borrusia Dortmund against Augsburg.
“I must say it was a real eye-opening tour. The whole idea was to pass the information on how they have been running the Bundesliga from the year 2000 up to now.
“Although everything was not entirely new, we learnt that they are doing the basics right. There has been a great transformation on and off the pitch and after curious observation, we realised that some of the successes they are enjoying are mainly as a result of the Fifa Club Licensing system instituted a few years back.
“This system really brings professionalism to the game but here we haven’t implemented it fully.
“The interesting feature is the success of their scoring and how they managed to shake off the bluntness in front of goal. But this is something that is a result of long term planning, since 2000,” said Ndebele.
Following the German national team’s failure to get out of the group stages at the European Championships in 2000, the German Football Federation began an overhaul of its system, putting the emphasis on clubs bringing youngsters through their academies and giving them first team chances at tender ages of 18, 19 and 20.
It is a system that is now reaping in the results, with players such as Mario Gotze, Marco Reus, and Mats Hummels all becoming Bundesliga and German national team regulars.
According to the Economist Magazine, instead of squandering money in transfer markets, German clubs now invest nearly €100m a year in academies.
There is a consensus that the emphatic nature of both Bayern Munich and Borussia Dortmund’s Champions League semi-final victories over Spain’s top sides only confirm the rise of the Bundesliga.
The Germans have fully embraced the club licensing system, which Zifa has been trying to sell to the clubs in recent years.
Under the club licencing system clubs are required to have a media office that handles all the communication with the media, a marketing department, proper finance office, a vibrant junior development programme and infrastructure that includes offices and stadia.
Ndebele emphasised the need to have a vibrant junior policy, which has helped German scale great heights in the last 10 years.
“I think we would like to look seriously at our junior development programmes. We should have proper junior policy without age cheating and making sure that these boys also get proper academic education.
“For instance all Bundesliga clubs are required to have an academy with not less than 12 German players in a team. They must also have at least seven to nine teams in total from the juniors up to the senior team.
“Teams can do well with well-established academies because that would mean a continuous chain supply of players. Teams won’t need to run around making those wholesale acquisitions.
“I think it is even more desirable for our teams to start investing seriously in young players. Dortmund for example have an average age of 25 years.
“It’s for our good because these clubs are now going the way of the academies and if we still need to continue exporting players abroad that will require us to go the same way.
“I am sure we have all see lots of talents coming up in Zimbabwe. If you look at our team that played the World Cup qualifier against Egypt recently there were about three or four players who played together at DC Academy and Aces Youth Academy.
“So imagine if we have more academies getting the necessary support? Today if a club like Dynamos, Highlanders or CAPS United would flight an advert in the newspaper calling for trials, I cannot imagine the response.”
Ndebele said the clubs needed to sit down and come up with strategic plans for the future to make football business successful.
“The most important thing is for clubs to organise themselves and try to explore all avenues to bring revenue so that they do not depend entirely on gate takings. A club like
Borrusia Dortmund is raking in an average of 70-80 million euros every year through the sale of the club’s merchandise.
“We are not saying our clubs can make that much but we are encouraging them to follow the route. Even if they make US$7 000, that would be a good starting point.
“Some may ask is it possible in our context? It’s possible here because we always see people selling flags, replica jerseys and other items at our stadia but the clubs are not benefiting anything. There are also assortments of things being sold in the stadiums but that would need a proper arrangement with the relevant authorities to benefit the clubs as well.
“It’s important for clubs to look for technical sponsors and have their jerseys branded. There is a big marketing opportunity with the coming of SuperSport on board because now we are not looking at spectatorship alone but at viewership as well.
“If that is done well we would need to revise our gate charges to attract more people at the stadiums. The Germans have reduced their gate entrants’ fees and on average the Bundesliga ticket is cheaper compared to the rest of Europe,” said Ndebele.
Online Reporter