School football coaches to be licenced , says Ogwel
Serious concern. Patrick Ogwel, NCS acting General Secretary says the continued use of mercenaries in inter-schools competitions is because of continued use of coaches who care less about integrity. Photo by George Katongole
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Elsie Namagambe, the director of Naluvule College in Wobulenzi District is a Caf Level ‘C’ licenced coach. She thinks Fufa should consider making the courses more affordable.
KAMPALA. Government is attempting to integrate coaching with professional teachers to be able to get rid of illegitimate players in schools competitions.
Patrick Ogwel, the acting General Secretary of the National Council of Sports (NCS) says the continued use of mercenaries in inter-schools competitions is because of continued use of coaches who care less about integrity.
Up to four schools were disqualified from this year’s Copa Coca-Cola Schools Cup that ended in Jinja yet several other players were screened out. In one scenario, Kapchorwa Standard Academy failed to complete a game against Jinja Progressive after the seventh player that had started the game was injured with the score at 4-0 in 19 minutes.
Ogwel told Sunday Monitor that coaches that don’t have an idea on how schools run keep stuffing players in teams, sometimes without the knowledge of school administrators.
“When you have a teacher managing a school team, chances are high that he will respect the school for fear of a backlash once the team is disqualified, yet a coach will simply move to another school,” Ogwel said.
Subsidies
Fufa vice president in charge of administration Justus Mugisha, also the director of Standard High Zzana said that they will work with regional football associations next season to be able to carry out training. “There will be no more use of amateur coaches. At this stage we need to manage our players professionally and next year all participating teams will be handled by trained coaches,” he said.
Currently, most of the coaching courses are conducted at Njeru Technical Centre for fees ranging between Shs150,000-200,000. To most rural schools that rely on the services of games teachers, logistics make such courses prohibitive.
Elsie Namagambe, the director of Naluvule College in Wobulenzi District is a Caf Level ‘C’ licenced coach. She thinks Fufa should consider making the courses more affordable.
“Even their timing matters and for schools holiday time must be targeted,” Namagambe said.
