John Kaputa faults big clubs on coaches’ hiring
Football Association of Malawi (Fam) technical director, John Kaputa, has blamed domestic top football clubs for failing to act professionally when hiring coaches, a situation he said leads to the country’s failure to benefit from highly-qualified coaches with fresh ideas.
Kaputa on Monday said most of the top clubs go for ‘recycled’ coaches because they have an affiliation with the particular teams as former players or officials.
“We have a lot of qualified coaches and others even have Caf A Licences. The problem is that most clubs want to engage coaches that have high association with that particular club. That is the reason why highly-qualified coaches do not find room to coach top clubs in Malawi. The clubs want to employ a supporter and not a quality coach,” he said.
“We are going around the same cycle. We fire the coach today and we go for him again after two years, yet we are bringing in new blood and sending coaches for training abroad. People should understand that a coach is not a supporter. A coach is a professional who is highly-qualified. We are going to continue to train more coaches.”
Be Forward Wanderers general secretary, Mike Butao, could not be reached for comment while Bullets vice-secretary, Kelvin Moyo, said his club focuses on quality of coaches when conducting a recruitment process.
“From history, we have always looked at the qualifications of the coaches. We have employed Eddington Ng’onamo and Gerald Phiri who have connections with Wanderers. We have also employed Elia Kananji,” he said.
Moyo, however, admitted there is a bias towards coaches who are affiliated with the clubs.
“We always have to promote coaches who have made a contribution to the club in the past. They are the ideal choice because they know the tradition and the system at the club,” he said.
In some of the recent cases, Silver Strikers brought back Young Chimodzi and Lovemore Fazili for a fourth stint at the club, whereas Bullets were targeting Kinnah Phiri to return to the club.
Wanderers have usually recalled Yasin Osman and Jack Chamangwana to help the team when it is struggling.
In 2012, while in charge of Bullets, Ng’onamo and Phiri were accused by the Bullets fans of sabotage whenever they registered poor results. The fans claimed the two coaches were ‘Wanderers fans’. Several newly-trained coaches have always complained that the door to most clubs is shut on them.
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