By Omoghene Benedict
Following the draws of the 13th Edition of the Royal Cup challenge sponsored by a betting firm, Bet9a, Government Model School Football Pitch, Asaba in Delta state will host the opening football match of the tournament between Texas Academy Football Club and Royal Football Club both of Asaba on the 14th September, 2019.
The draws which took place at Wellington Hotels, Effurun in Uvwie Local Government also witnessed the training of team Coaches on Capacity Building Workshop in the state.
In the draws, Excellent Football Academy and Excellent Football Club both of Ughelli North will trade tackles in one of the opening match/knockouts.
According to the organizers and sponsors of the tournament, 107 Teams from 22 local government Areas of the state registered out which 39 Teams will automatically qualify for the group stage and there be a playoff for outstanding teams that could not qualify automatically.
At the training of Coaches, the Director of Coaching Education and National Training Officer of the Nigeria Football Coaches Association, NFCA, Henry Abiodun centered on ‘Advanced Training Program (ATP) & System of Training’ enjoined coaches to continually avail themselves to learning new methodologies in the profession of coaching football.
Abiodun held that “coaches must continue to learn and acquire more knowledge and instill the six areas of fitness discipline on their players which includes, Physical fitness, Phycological fitness, Medical fitness, Intellectual fitness, Technical fitness and Tactical fitness to ensure that their players are loaded.
“They must understand that knowledge is power, so whenever they find the opportunity and platform where they can increase their knowledge, they should make sure they take advantage to use such opportunity to their advantage. My candid advise is that whenever these opportunities such as seminars, workshops and coaching courses comes up, coaches should grab it because the game continue to change, different challenges comes up and if you don’t update your knowledge then you are left out”
Coach Abiodun added, “As a football coach, you must make it a habit to develop an outline of training generally called a training program and these outlines should either be short term, long term or training unit for daily practice that would be guided with principles.”
Also, Licensee Football Agent, Mr. Eddie Oseri Ogbemudia, of Myron Top Class Outfit, described the coaching profession as a job with a lot of earnings, if proper structure and documentation are put in place, saying; football is not solely about running on the pitch, but also entails huge financial gains.
“We have untrustworthy Agents in this business, they tend to be very fast in order to make money for themselves to the detriment of others. I have met a lot of them and the coaches also have their own side of the story.
“An intermediary should act as a mentor, assistant in player with his mental, physical, technical and tactical development. He should be experienced in handling contracts negotiations and promotion of players image right.”
Speaking on training compensation and solidarity mechanism, a sports lawyer, kelvin Omuojine charged grassroots coaches to always take proper documentation of player seriously in other to save them from legal issues with foreign football clubs that could identify fresh players from the grassroots.
