The Sunday News
Ngqwele Dube, Sports Correspondent
ZIMBABWE is set to get additional Caf coach educators following the hosting of a Caf instructors’ course in Zambia that was attended by local coaches, Joseph Sibindi and Tafadzwa Mashiri.
The five-day course, that had participants from across Southern Africa and was fully funded by Fifa, will see Sibindi and Mashiri being added to the pool of Caf instructors the country has.
Zifa technical director, Wilson Mutekede said they are looking at having between 10 to 12 instructors in the long run to ensure they are able to adequately meet the country’s training needs.
“As you are aware, Caf has been realigning its coaching courses coming up with a new syllabus hence the need to retrain and train new coach educators so as to effectively teach the new curriculum.
“We have four instructors at the moment but we will be gradually having more and more attending these Caf courses and qualifying to become instructors. We will be awaiting communication from Caf to hear if the two (Sibindi and Mashiri) have qualified after going through the course,” he said.
Mutekede said they selected Mashiri and Sibindi to attend the course because of emphasis on academic qualifications by Caf and Fifa and a background in teaching for one to become an instructor.
Caf instructors on the Zifa roll include Mutekede, Maxwell Takaendesa Jongwe, Triangle coach, Taurai Mangwiro and Nelson Matongorere.
Sibindi said the course opened them to new frontiers of coaching with particular emphasis on the appreciation of adult learning.
“It was an intensive course that ran the full day from 9am to 10pm and involved theory and practical with teaching methodology being the main emphasis as it has been realised that with adults the learning approach needs to change.
“We explored the global form model in which players are given room to play and then analysis follows which seeks to correct whatever was done wrong while the progressive model is the usual method that involves warm up drills, skills training, tactics and game situations,” he said.
Sibindi said there was emphasis on developing coaches in a more conducive and amiable environment that would allow any coach taking part in a class to feel free to express themselves and not be frustrated.
He revealed they learnt Caf was seeking to align coaching standards to enable coaches on the continent to travel abroad without having their credentials questioned.
A change in attaining coach instructors’ qualifications now means there will be continuous assessment and mentorship with mentors from Caf attending local courses to assess and aid the coach educators to a level they are able to be deployed beyond the borders.
Sibindi said the course was specific to Caf B, the area they would be focusing on once they are qualified.
The Caf standardised coaches courses begin with Caf D, basic and grassroots coaching aimed at ages between 6-12 while Caf C covers basic youth coaching (12-15 years), Caf B coaches will be able to teach youth and senior amateur teams while Caf A would cover elite youth and national amateur level with the Caf Pro level targeted at professional clubs and national teams.
The Zambian course had South African, Lestoaka Serame and Mohamed Basir as facilitators.
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