GIVE DE JONGH A CHANCE, SEILBEA TELLS COACHES

MBABANE – Veteran coach Fritz Seilbea has implored local coaches to give newly-appointed Sihlangu mentor Pieter de Jongh a chance before criticising him.

He said it was the responsibility of the FA to hire an expatriate if that particular person would improve the standard of the sport in the country. He said local coaches could only watch him, learn from him if he proved to be knowledgeable and only judge him thereafter.

Seilbea, in a three page letter, was responding to weekend reports attributed to Swaziland Football Coaches Association (SFCA) Chairman Anthony Mdluli during the Club Licensing meeting of PLS Board of Governors, that local coaches were not getting the support that their foreign counterparts were receiving.

“I have seen cases where a local coach was given overwhelming support at Sihlangu to the point whereby his removal sparked a nationwide reaction. To me that is ultimate support for local coach,” Seilbea said.
He said even the current Sihlangu coach should be allowed to work, be assessed and then judged later.
“When reputable expatriate coaches are hired to run our teams, local coaches should then be hired to assist those expatriates so that they may gain the necessary experience to enable them to coach premier league teams in the future,” he said.

He said he was opposed to the current practice where local coaches would graduate with a coaching licence and then want to coach a premier league team without having acquired the needed experience to coach at that level.
He said the six senior coaches that are being said to be rotated by the elite teams were not products of the FA licensing progammes but acquired their knowledge and experience long before these programmes.
“When a young police recruit graduate he/she does not go straight to be a station commander, but he has to rise through the ranks, serve under the experienced officers. The same occurred with all the other professions. Why should it change when it comes to coaching?” he asked.

FA Marketing and Communications Officer Muzi Radebe said the organisation cannot comment on the issue because they were not privy to the concerns raised by Seilbea. However, he said it was known practice that you cannot judge someone before he could even start working.

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