FACT: After eight games without victory, Bafana Bafana are in the same predicament of continual result failure ahead of their crucial 2014 FIFA World Cup qualifiers in June!
The last time the national team won a match was against Burkina Faso in August last year. But against an inexperienced and younger opposition yet, Senegal’s U23, excuses like “missed chances” are again given as phony reasons for the umpteenth failure. MaximalFootball.com insists it doesn't help to perpetuate complains and re-cycle negativity about SA football without identifying the real reasons of this chronic crisis. Acceptance must be given to the fact that until ALL the wrongs are eliminated new efforts and ideas for improvement cannot work. Maximalfootball.com asked Ted Dumitru to use all possible sources of information from countries that encountered similar major failures, to compile a document that comprises anything that would deny SA football the much-hoped-for resurrection to life. This crucial information must be acknowledged from the highest level of SA football administration to the last football fan in the country.
Universal wisdom in the sport serves here to ward off possible ruinous mentalities, actions and conditions that are dwindling SA Football.
The following critical 50 instances carry the potential to wane the national game. Beware:
1. Ignoring the magnitude and role football plays in SA society and indiscriminately allowing its number 1 national sport status be shared with sports of limited national and international popularity.
2. Failure to accept and implement the fact that to match the leading examples in the World, SA football must benefit from no less than 70% of the country’s sport spectatorship, sport financial resources and sponsorship, facilities and media coverage.
3. Denying national football sovereignty and national interest by allowing foreign cultures, influences and interests to control technical and administrative aspects of the game and SA’s young talent.
4. Overlooking the need that SA football culture has to reflect the values of the past, positive traditions and history.
5. Repudiating acceptance, recognition and application of a unitary national football mentality and style which reflect the characteristics and strengths of the majority (over 80%) of SA players.
6. Non-existence of a Football Performance System where all factors and conditions responsible for optimizing development and performance are effectively ensemble coordinated and controlled.
7. The non-inclusion of people from key areas of technical expertise with high level skills in strategic thinking, long-term planning and progress monitoring in the NEC.
8. Improper set-up and regulatory frame in addressing vital technical policies and technical expertise related challenges as the Association’s Technical Committee cannot exercise its functions of conceiving and implementing policies, measures and programs due to unqualified interference.
9. Ineffective composition of various Committees in the technical and administrative structure of the Association due to severe shortage of multi-disciplinary expertise – capable and experienced people who can provide valuable scientific input from areas of high performance, youth development, sport medicine, etc.
10. Critical and general insufficiency of administrators with technical knowledge at club level and local associations, which makes it very difficult to introduce and operate programs of technical nature – coaching, youth development, sport science, refereeing, etc.
11. Allowing individual club ownership to operate without community base and representation and without proper structures and democratically governed procedures.
12. Maintaining illogical disparity in school sport between ‘underprivileged’ football and ruling ‘elite’ codes such as Rugby and Cricket – sports which among other peculiarities score low on the scale of general fitness, dynamic nature and attractiveness/creativity (contrary to what is required in modern youth sport programs).
13. Not recognizing the capital importance of football facilities at all levels of participation as the number, quality and accessibility to facilities for Rugby, Cricket and other minor sports in schools, universities and municipalities reflect the ludicrous depravation of football facilities – there are up to 17 other sport facilities to one football ground.
14. Not being aware of the essential need for developing a large number of small grounds for mini-football – 5vs5, 8vs8, etc., especially in the rural and township areas.
15. Disregarding the fact that school football cannot be developed through school competitions without first providing the schools with football instructors or teacher-coaches.
16. Exaggerating the role of early age competitions in youth development, especially harmful being the 11-a-side format for the U12 age groups.
17. Limiting the performance maturation, competiveness and progress of young players in their final stage of development by not providing seasonal Youth National Championships for the U17 and U19.
18. Failing to eradicate the false practice of copying and bench-marking of foreign - mostly European - technical solutions as the coaching content, training methods, selection criteria, play systems, etc., do not work outside of the culture and environment that created them.
19. Incapacity to acknowledge and react to the irreversibly damaging effects to maximizing SA players’ performance potential by foreign coaches who, although some are well qualified, have no comprehensive knowledge on the unique bio-social and cultural profile of SA players.
20. Maintaining inadequate, incomplete and contrasting coach education curriculum instead of replacing it with a concept that is scientific on principles, but strictly SA specific in content and application.
21. Insufficient generic subjects in the syllabus of coach education to facilitate understanding of ever increased scientific findings related to the development of players and performance.
22. Incorrectly prioritizing the development of coaches for competitive football instead of addressing first the huge need for qualified youth and elite youth coaches.
23. Unavailability of academic coaching qualification programs.
24. Applying irrelevant criteria for talent discovery – not reflecting the valuable traits/strengths of SA youth such as aptitude for superior ball skills, dynamic and creative movement, improvisation, etc.
25. Undermining the key principle of youth development which requires complete cycle of systematic training and progressive competition participation – ’10 years and 10.000 hours of training’.
26. Disunity and disorder in the concept, objectives, methods and structural organization of youth development with various fragmented activities in the country.
27. Showing indifference in the case of foreign youth philosophies being enforced by both local and foreign youth coaches resulting in the distortion and/or nullifying some unique qualities of SA youth.
28. Not recognizing in the search of developing of a valuable, unique and highly competitive national football concept the pre-requisite of a unified football mentality where SA players of different ethnic and race background share the same playing philosophy and add value to the game by adapting their abilities to the native specificity of African players.
29. Depriving the youth development of latest and superior training methods which maximize training effects by providing, for example, high rate of ball touches, e.g., 15-20 per minute exercise, in conditions of uninterrupted and diversified football brain stimulation.
30. Denying players progress and talent optimization by wrongly considering fitness and tactics before mastering ball skills and enhancing playing intelligence.
31. Enforcing rigid play systems despite SA players’ lower ability to perform within the strict requirements of positional football while being extremely capable to play multi-positional/functional approach supported by creative and high dynamics mobility.
32. Unrealistically applying the ‘long ball’ and high percentage crossing tactics in contrast with SA players’ ideal predispositions for short passing maximized by rapidity, disguise and creative intricate moves.
33. Resisting changes in the training methodology where scientific findings endorse the application of more efficient multi-factor exercise concurrently with football brain stimulation (Maximal Training) and functional conditioning to replace the obsolete factor-by-factor and gym weight training.
34. Insisting on developing specialized players (positions and specialized tasks) instead of adopting the new trend of producing multi-functional players.
35. Lack of Elite Youth programs which supposed to provide the best talent at the youth level with high performance solutions - periodical centralized intensive preparation, international competitions, continual performance monitoring and promotion to the national teams.
36. Ignoring the requirement of early exposure of the best young players to international competition beginning at the age of 14-15 years.
37. Scarce coaching/training literature, visual info, TV programs and technical publications.
38. The absence of multi-disciplinary football science to replace the ineffective and irrelevant general sport science which utilize imported performance parameters, protocols and data mostly from contrasting European sources – in disregard of the specific bio-social profile of SA players.
39. Under-qualified physical trainers, gym instructors, physiologists and psychologists who have no insight of the game or previous football experience as players or technicians in SA football environment.
40. Insufficient support systems – medical services, nutritionists and psychologists available to youth development.
41. Underestimating the factors and conditions in building the national team at the highest international standards and level of competitiveness, mainly the absolute necessity of first developing a national playing identity followed by build-up cycle of 6-10 year plan.
42. Not recognizing the role and importance of professional clubs in providing the national teams with players who can perform at their best form but also share common club and national team essential components of SA football philosophy.
43. Minimizing the significance of advanced knowledge, successful experience, innovative mind and multi-dimensional personality in appointing national coaches.
44. Ignoring the paramount need of uniformity on playing mentality, basic team organization and technical/tactical requirements among all national teams.
45. Disregarding the necessity of including all competitions into a National Competition System with inter-related objectives and regulated by non-divergent policies and rules.
46. Disparity between referees’ interpretation of the laws of the game and general style and mentality reflected in the local and/or international football.
47. Indiscriminate, excessive and partisan promotion by the media of certain foreign football cultures, influences and competitions that might not be in the best interest of the development and international emancipation of SA football.
48. Not recognizing harmful consequences of the personality cult in the governance of football which, as demonstrated by many world-wide examples, could lead to destabilizing and regress of the game.
49. Lesser vigilance towards abuse of power, incompetence, discriminatory acts, nepotism, unfairness and ignorance which constitute the global recipe for failure and chronic decline.
50. Non-commitment to the belief that SA has the potential to become a power-house in the football World producing a unique, spectacular and winning brand of football.
We all have to agree there is an urgent need to revamp local football based on the points mentioned above. In modern football, it’s either the right way or the wrong way. There are only two options: Success or Failure. Perpetual contempt of these 50 points will herald the latter. There is never a ‘middle stance’!
By Ted Dumitru
For http://maximalfootball.com/
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