Be Forward Wanderers and Silver Strikers have expressed concern over the frequent absence of their coaches for national duty.
Nomads head coach Bob Mpinganjira and the Central Bankers’ assistant coach Lovemore Fazili are part of the Flames’ interim technical panel headed by Meke Mwase of TN Stars for the upcoming Championship of African Nations’ qualifiers against e-Swatini (formerly Swaziland).
Wanderers general secretary Mike Butao said the on-and-off availability is affecting his team, especially now when they are preparing for the TNM Super League which kicks off this Saturday.
“While I am happy for Bob, on the other hand it is affecting the operations of the technical panel as our assistant coach [Allan Kamanga] does not have a CAF B coaching licence and what this means is that we could be forced to look around for a qualified coach to sit in for Bob and that translates to extra costs.
“Our worry is that there is also the Cosafa Cup coming up and we doubt if they [FAM] would have a permanent coaching panel in place by then. Does it mean FAM did not have a succession plan in place? Because surely RVG [Ronny van Geneugden] had under-studies in place,” he said.
His Silver counterpart, Lawrence Yobe, also said Fazili’s absence will affect his team.
“It is an inconvenience because much as we have Young Chimodzi as the head coach and [Peter] Mgangira as the second assistant coach, they draw up a schedule on how they work and, therefore, Fazili’s absence will affect us.
“Moreover, I have just heard it unofficially from Fazili that he is supposed to travel to Blantyre today [yesterday] and he will return tomorrow [today] and that means he miss two days’ training and yet we have not heard anything from FAM,” he said.
FAM technical sub-committee chairperson James Mwenda, who is also the association’s vice president, refused to comment while general secretary Alfred Gunda was not available for comment.
