Springs Home Sweepers women’s team coach Joseph ‘Skheshe’ Mkhonza says the coronavirus-enforced stoppage of women’s football has offered him the opportunity to make extensive plans for his club for the next few years. The Gauteng Sasol Women’s had only started with the 2020 season, with most teams having played just three games, when the season was halted due to the pandemic in mid-March.
‘Imbokodo’, as Home Sweepers are otherwise known, had had a lukewarm start to the season before then, having won their season opener 2-1 against Hallelujah Zebra Force in Tshwane before going down 3-1 to Croesus at Kwa-Thema Stadium.
The football governing body in the country, South African Football Association (SAFA), said last week it had received advice from two medical experts to resume football only if the national lockdown were to be downgraded to level 1, which suggests that it could be a while before the Women’s League, or any other league in the country, could resume. However, Mkhonza says there is some good that has come with being forced to stop playing and stay indoors.
“I’m not just sitting, I’m reading books. I’m preparing for the future so that when this thing (virus) passes, I know what I’m doing. I have a big chance to plan now, because I’m sitting and doing nothing. Now I’m preparing a programme for the next three/four years to come, to decide what I’m going to do for development. I’m going to go to schools and try to find children who are from 7 years to 9 years, so we can start with their development, so that by the time they are 12 years, they are very good.”
Mkhonza, who is also a former Banyana Banyana coach, has also weighed in on the increasing number of the women’s national team players who are being recruited overseas, and says it is as a result of the team’s gradual improvement. Banyana star players such as Thembi Kgatlana, Refiloe Jane and Jermaine Seoposenwe have in recent months signed for some of the European powerhouses in women’s football, not least Italian giants AC Milan, where Jane now plies her trade.
”Now we’re playing at the Olympics, we’re playing in the World Cup, and now they are seeing the South African girls, they are seeing Banyana Banyana. Now, the other countries which are strong in women’s football see these players in South Africa and they pick them. This is going to expose everyone, and now the other countries that are superpowers of women’s football are going to come to South Africa and look for players.
“I know there are people who are looking for players. When Banyana were playing in Tsakane against Lesotho (in early March), there were people from Slovakia looking for players. I was with them, and there are players they met. It’s good that the likes of Refiloe Jane and Thembi Kgatlana and the others – I think there are more than nine - are playing where they are; it is a good thing for women’s football in South Africa,” adds Mkhonza.
* Cover image: @sports_mvt Twitter account.
Comments