Guide and counsel young footballers
From left: Gor Mahia players Tito Okello, Benson Omala and Kelvin Wesonga attend a training session at Nyayo National Stadium on December 4, 2020.
What you need to know:
- They were emotionally high-strung when a penalty was awarded to Napsa in added time. Match officials accuse Gor players of attacking the referee and CAF is probing the matter.
- We must give our lads direction;we must teach them life, one way is using former players to mentor them to avoid such incidences.
The football players that we see on the pitch; those lads who make us happy or sad depending on their performance, are just young boys.
If they were in more organised and well-marketed leagues, such players would have been paid millions for their talent and their salaries would have been public knowledge!
During the period of the highest Covid-19 infections and deaths in Spain, a lady virologist rudely answered a journalist that Portuguese superstar Ronaldo (Cristiano) and Argentine legend Messi (Lionel) are paid millions per week (the information is in public domain) while virologists get much much less!
“You can go to them to give you a vaccine!” It was an apt answer tinged with bitterness.
We must remember that the lads we are talking about are just in their early 20s, and are bound to act their age. We expect them to mature very fast commensurate with their talents and earnings, but we put the cart in front of the horse.
It behoves all club management to think hard about some sort of guidance and counselling departments in their teams. These kids, left on their own, can do damage especially to themselves.
In their early twenties, most young people are bound to blunder without knowing the consequences of their actions; we do suppose there is some biological fact to that but we leave that angle since we lack the competence to dwell on it. We can only depend on observation of life.
In 1984, Gor Mahia on CAF duty travelled to Egypt to meet Zamalek; a penalty kick was awarded to Zamalek by the referee and Gor players did not like it. An altercation occurred leading to the stoppage of the match.
The team was banned for a long while and some players like maestro Abbas Khamis Magongo got the nickname Zamalek from the debacle. K’Ogalo were at their peak and that ban really harmed the team even though they came back and redeemed themselves in 1987 by taking the trophy.
The same scenario played out in Zambia a fortnight ago when Gor arrived just an hour to play against Napsa Stars in a CAF Condeferation Cup rematch.
They were emotionally high-strung when a penalty was awarded to Napsa in added time. Match officials accuse Gor players of attacking the referee and CAF is probing the matter.
We must give our lads direction;we must teach them life, one way is using former players to mentor them to avoid such incidences.
