30 Oct 2019

The ongoing advanced goalkeeper instructors’ course is expected to equip instructors with skills to improve professionalism in the game.

Botswana Football Association (BFA) technical director, Serame Letsoaka, said this during official opening of the course in Gaborone.

He said the course, which attracted 25 participants, was being facilitated by FIFA instructor, Alejandro Heredia. 

He said some of the participants were attending the course for the second time while others were doing it for the third time.

He said the course would go a long way in developing more coaches in the country.

“This is a multiplier effect where we are going to make sure that we develop many more coaches instead of having one instructor coming all the time to instruct 30 people at a time,” he said.

Letsoaka further noted that as part of BFA initiative, Heredia would come again to work with the participants who would succeed in this year’s course in order for them to learn how to analyse the game.

“The only way we can grow as a country is if we have experts in the game,” he added.

He lamented the absence of women’s participation in the course.

“It is not fair that we do not have women in this course, which is a challenge in improving the competitiveness of women in the game,” he said.

According to Letsoaka, Botswana only had one woman trained as a goalkeeper coach and she was not able to attend the course because it was an advanced course for those who attended it before.

He also said the BFA was planning to have one of the participants working in a specialised capacity with the technical department to make sure that there was proper training of goalkeepers and also advice instructors with the latest information on goalkeeping.

For his part, Heredia  said the course was an advanced level of goalkeeping, which needed attention.

He said the advanced course would move away from the basics of goalkeeping instruction such as handling, diving, kicking and distributing the ball  to focusing on reviewing, understanding and analysing different goalkeepers.

“At the end of the day, we should have really good goalkeeper coaches who are able to coach at all levels,” he said. ENDS