Football Association of Malawi (Fam) President Walter Nyamilandu has challenged local coaches to prove their worth to be considered for national football team jobs.
Nyamilandu made the remarks during the opening of the Uefa Elite Youth Coaching Seminar at Bingu National Stadium in Lilongwe on Monday.
“The national team is for local coaches. If they are capable, we will not hesitate to appoint them for all the national teams. We will train them, as we have done with several coaches such as Meck Mwase and Patrick Mabedi, to expose them,’’ Nyamilandu said.
For a long time, the association has been under heavy criticism for having appetite for foreign coaches at the expense of local coaches.
Interestingly, only local coaches have guided the Flames to the African Cup of Nations (Afcon) finals in the history of Malawi football.
- Advertisement -
Late Henry Moyo was first to guide the Flames in 1984 in Ivory Coast before Kinnah Phiri achieved the same feat in 2010 in Angola and Mwase in 2021 in Cameroon.
However, Nyamilandu admitted that despite the success with local coaches, there is a huge gap in Malawi due to lack of proper training.
He said through training such as Uefa Elite Youth Coaching, the country will produce several coaches.
“Coaching is a big problem in Malawi. The demand for coaches in Malawi is huge. We have seen a lot of coaches without qualifications but with passion for the game; so, we need to capacitate them. We are training new crop of coaches. We want to broaden our catchment base so that we have a new generation of coaches,’’ he said.
- Advertisement -
- Advertisement -
The Uefa Elite Youth Coaching seminar has attracted 30 coaches from FCB Under 20 League. Uefa technical expert Roger Meintry said the coaches will undergo both theory and practicals on technical aspects of the game.
“We have a lot of young coaches and the idea is to talk about football. It is an interactive seminar and we will spend more time on the pitch and analyse together,’’ he said.
One of the coaches, Joy Kakhona said the seminar will help uplift the standards of the game in Malawi.
