12 Feb 2020

Botswana Football Association (BFA), in collaboration with the German Olympic Sports Confederation, held a coaching and referees course for Tswapong Region football at Botswana International University of Science and Technology (BIUST).

The four-day course, which took place on Saturday, was meant to upgrade the skills and knowledge of coaches and referees as well as the regulations that govern the sport.

BFA vice president, Maslow Motlogelwa said the course was timely and in line with the BFA objective of revamping the football body in the country.

He said the BFA National Executive Committee (NEC) had resolved to develop and grow football and to build capacity from the grassroots level.

The aim, he said, was to capacitate all spheres including coaches, referees and the administration.

He said the associations ambition was to produce quality football which was more inclusive.

Motlogelwa noted that roughly 80 per cent of the BFA budget had been allocated to the development of football from the grassroots level in all regions.

He said the organisation would work hand in hand with associations such as BISA among other sporting bodies in the country.

Motlogelwa stated that the BFA was making efforts to upgrade the management level of football clubs. He said the BFA was in the process of linking up with the FIFA connect programme to register all football players and clubs with FIFA.

He said the association would also partner with local mobile networks such as Bemobile, Mascom and Orange to avail online information on registered players in the country.

Referee instructor, Jonti Rasetsoga appreciated the course and what it aimed to achieve.

He was also of the view that more young girls and women needed to be engaged in the sport.

Tswapong Region vice chairperson, Ntebogang Tsietsi said that she was humbled that the region was selected to have the clinic.

She said football players had to be identified and groomed from a young age. She also said girls should be supported in football.

Tsietse said regions should be supported because most talent came from them.

In an interview after the course, Dr Carolin Braun explained that the German Olympic Sports Confederation, together with the Federal Foreign Office of Germany, were cooperating with the BFA, Ministry of Youth Empowerment, Sport and Culture Development to improve football in Botswana.

She said the course was about coach education and mentoring of coaches and the development of coaches in the regions.

Braun said coaches were trained on the basics of shooting, dribbling, first aid and goalkeeping.

She said referees made part of the training clinic so that they could groom upcoming ones.

She said the training cooperation between the BFA and German entities was a two-year contract with the possibility of extending by another two years after the end of the current contract which started last year. ENDS