admin
Ricky Zililo, Senior Sports Reporter
ZIFA has set its sights on partnering the Ministry of Primary and Secondary Education for the training of coaches, a key component in development of footballers at the elementary stage.
Emerging from their executive committee meeting last Friday, Zifa set in motion training of teachers who interact with young footballers at an early stage to make sure that they are capacitated to give proper techniques to aspiring footballers.
The move to engage schools, a strategic stakeholder in football development as they cover all the corners of the country unlike provincial leagues which are central to certain areas, is seen as key in young footballers’ growth.
In a statement about the Zifa board resolutions, the national football mother body said: “The association will partner the Ministry of Primary and Secondary Education for the training of coaches.
This is meant to capacitate schools with the requisite expertise, and it will go a long way in developing the beautiful game.”
Zifa technical development chairperson Kenneth Mhlophe said training of teachers is part of their efforts of adhering to standardisation of coaches.
“We’re not reinventing anything but just applying the policies. We spoke about qualified personnel being at the bench and we’ve implemented that. We’re heading to lower divisions up to schools,” said Mhlophe.
Zifa implemented standardisation for local football coaching that requires all topflight coaches to possess a Caf A licence at the beginning of the 2017 season.
Standardisation of coaches meant that Premiership gaffers and their trainers should be in possession of a Caf A badge. Division One coaches should have a minimum of Caf B while assistant coaches are required to be holders of a Caf C or Zifa Level Four licence.
In the Second Division, a coach should have a Caf C licence while his understudies are required to have a Level Three qualification as a minimum standard.
The coaching standards also cascaded down to Division Three, tertiary institutions and schools. For secondary schools, a Zifa Level Two badge became mandatory and primary school football coaches were expected to have at least Level Two certificate.
Acting Zifa president Gift Banda is on record saying Zimbabwe should use its suspension from international football to establish developmental plans that will guide football operations.
Banda wants to make sure that when Zimbabwe returns to international football, national teams from juniors to seniors are competitive and have proper structures.
The acting Zifa president says together with his colleagues, they are in unison that to have successful results with senior teams everything starts from having a strong foundation at grassroots level, junior teams.
Part of establishing the foundation at the development stage is to re-establish provincial junior teams that will periodically compete and that will help Zifa come up with a proper database to follow players’ development and weed out age cheating. – @ZililoR
Online Reporter