The Sunday News
Ngqwele Dube Phineas Mukwazo
THE long wait for the arrival of Highlanders head coach Erol Akbay is finally over with the Dutchman expected at number 50 Robert Mugabe Way on Tuesday. In a telephone interview from his base in Holland an excited Akbay confirmed that he will be arriving in the country on Tuesday saying he was eager to hit the ground
running. “I will leave Amsterdam on Monday morning for Johannesburg where I will stay for one night before catching a connecting flight to Bulawayo on Tuesday morning arriving in Bulawayo at 12 noon,’’ said Akbay.
He said he was full of credit for his assistant Amini Soma-Phiri for holding fort in his absence.
“I know he (Amini) is a good coach, and he was doing a very good job there. I am very happy that my paperwork is done, so that I can assume my mandate at the most beautiful club in Zimbabwe. I know it was a long and anxious wait for the permit. But it’s now done. And I am very excited to start working for Highlanders,’’ he said.
The club submitted the coach’s work permit application at the immigration offices in Harare last week and they expect the document to be out mid-week allowing the coach to start his duties hopefully before weekend.
According to immigration regulations a person has to apply for a work permit while he is still in his home country. Highlanders’ chief executive officer Ndumiso Gumede also confirmed they had submitted all the required documents and the permit was being processed.
The team has been going through pre-season training under the watchful eye of assistant coach, Soma-Phiri and goalkeepers coach, Cosmas Zulu and the arrival of Akbay is likely to see the preparations going into full gear.
“We have submitted all the documents needed for the application and we are confident we could be getting the permit by mid-week allowing Akbay to arrive at the club before the end of the week. We had to follow due processes but we are glad everything is going on well and all the anxiety the Highlanders family has been experiencing will end,” he said.
The long drawn out process has seen some criticising the Highlanders secretariat particularly after Dynamos seemed to have a stroll in the park in securing their Portuguese coach Paulo Jorge Silva’s work permit days after his arrival.
Akbay has been given a two-year performance based contract with demands that he wins the league in his second year while the target for the first year is to finish in the top four. Akbay becomes the third European mentor to take charge of the Highlanders’ dressing room after Britons Bobby Clark and the late Eddy May. The two left indelible marks on the club and hopes will be equally high that Akbay too leaves a lasting legacy at the oldest football club in Zimbabwe.
