Today I think I should tell you a bit about what we do outside of our coaching sessions.
Of course football is often involved. We play 5 a side matches with the guys who work here at the club. It’s never just a friendly kick about with them, but that’s just fine with me. It reminds me of the matches we used to play at the end of our coach education sessions in London .This location is a bit different though:
This perfect 5 a side pitch, surrounded by beautiful green mountains, lies in the clubs gardens in Manica. I genuinely think it must be one of the most incredible 5 a side venues in the world. I feel very lucky to play here. It was built in 2010. As part of the legacy of the South African world cup, FIFA invested in 20 different projects across Africa. Thankfully they chose to build this pitch in Manica as one of the projects. It is often used to host tournaments for the local kids.
Right alongside the five a side pitch, there is a full size 11 a side pitch. The long term plan is that this will become the pitch where GDM train and play their home matches. The quality of the pitch is far superior to the one they currently use, and the potential football ground that could become here is staggering. It will though take years of development around the pitch until the venue can pass as suitable to play professional league matches. However, friendly matches can be played here.
This is how I have spent my last 3 Saturdays. There have been 3 friendly matches, where GDMs B team has faced the group of players who play on the 5 a side, including myself and the other gappers. Two of the matches have been won by us and the other match finished in a tight 3-3 draw. I havent played 11 a side in a long time and although lacking fitness and sharpness I’m happy that I managed to get a few goals.
Speaking of fitness. I try and gain some by running up steps with a teacher and a coach from the club. 127 steps to be precise, which lead to an old abandoned church. One time I beat a personal challenge, as I went up and down the steps 10 times. Meaning I faced 2540 steps. Haven’t done that many again since though.
One thing you have to know about the people at this club is that they are obsessed with pool. The pool table in the centre of the bar seems like the clubs most valued assest. The table is always occupied, giving me very little opportunity to practise, meaning I’m still rubbish (but still better than Albin and Armando).
For a bit of fun and to help raise some money for the club, I had an idea to do a pool tournament. You would have thought that the players lives were on the line. The clubhouse was silent for the duration of the games to allow the players to focus and then the place erupted every time the black ball was potted. One of the workers here Chi Chone pretended to be a journalist, he would rush over to the winner of each game and pretend to interview them with his phone. It was all a lot of fun.
The bars other main attraction is the TV. On the weekends it is packed out as the locals gather together to watch the Premier league matches. Actually the busiest I have ever seen the place was yesterday for the El Clasico. The bar was split 50-50 with very animated Barcelona and Madrid fans. They were going crazy as Ronaldo completed the comeback late on. Cherife (club physio and big Barcelona fan) sprinted out the room to prevent getting smothered by all the Madrid fans.
Other than this we spend time chilling with the first team players and strolling around the town, as we continue to get a taste for the African culture. Actually we spend a lot of the time waiting for bread at the very popular Pao Manica.
Now from a first team perspective it wasn’t looking too great this time last week. We had just lost 1-0 and the team morale and confidence was down. We decided in our coaches meeting on Monday that instead of normal training the next day we should have a group discussion instead to try and sort it out. It went well as players and coaches openly voiced their opinions. This may well turn out to be the turning point. The players have discovered new energy and fight as well as belief in themselves and the team.
Yesterday we drew 0-0, but we were very encouraged due to the much improved performance and even more so with the fact the players worked so hard as a team. We have another game on Thursday and were gonna win, till then….
