Development

New Technical Director hits the ground running

Jun 21, 2018

The new Technical Director of Botswana Football Association, Serame Letsoaka, says he wants to see Zebras rankings improve to the Top 50 – 70 in the world during his time at the helm of the technical department.

Letsoaka, a qualified FIFA and CAF instructor, says the only way we can achieve this, is to ensure that the BFA’s development plan is carried out in full and local coaches are part of it.

“We must produce the right kind of coaches in the country to address the needs of our game. The fact that there are only three local coaches with an A License, is a serious challenge to me. And that means I have to hit the ground running,” said Mr Letsoaka.

He promised to challenge the norm of the younger player not being given a chance to play more, promising a policy review. He shared his roadmap (see download below) with the media which he described as the solution to Botswana football.

For his part, BFA’s Vice President, Marshlow Motlogelwa said when the current administration came in power, their biggest dream was to revolutionize the face of football as well as ensure there is a robust long-term development for the future of our football. Over the past few months, they have been working around the clock, planning and putting into play the development model for our country.

BFA has partnered with Premier skills for the development of grass root coaches, the program last year was utilized to train over 50 grass root couches in our four blocks and we intend to grow the number to all primary schools.

Motlogelwa also highlighted that they have had a German technical expert come to the country to assess the tactical and technical levels of our coaches and players, as from August we will have them for 3 years to continue assisting with coach evaluation and monitoring.

BFA has also started the Elite Youth League and Youth League to ensure mass participation and proper training of our future footballer which is a key to the future of football. All these initiatives that BFA has started, together with the administration’s strong will and passion, results are coming.

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Development

BFA LAUNCHES FIFA TALENT DEVELOPMENT SCHEME PROJECT

𝗚𝗔𝗕𝗢𝗥𝗢𝗡𝗘: Botswana Football Association today the 21st April 2023, launched an innovative FIFA Talent Development Scheme (TDS), to help raise the standards of junior national football teams for both men and women, driven by FIFA’s desire for a long-term dedication to global talent development.

The programme is also aimed to help the association achieve its full potential and continuing the measures taken to reduce the disparity in the level of football between different countries.

The project objectives are to create a platform for emerging talent that will expose them quality coaching and competitive environment, to create a pool of players to be selected for junior national team (U15, U17 and U20) and to build a strong base for competitive junior national teams and sustain their success at all levels.

The identified players will be channeled to Radisele and Mogoditshane Centres of Sports Excellence with the possibility of expanding to other areas. The teams will be training on a daily basis with qualified coaches and playing games every week. U15 national team shall be fixtured in Tswapong Region U17 youth league while U17 team shall be fixtured in Tswapong Region Division 1. U19 team will have game time by locking horns with the first division league teams where it will be fixtured.

Giving his welcome remarks BFA vice president 1 also the acting president, Mr. Masego Nchingane made it known the purpose of today is to launch two (2) talent Development Centres namely Mogoditshane Senior Secondary School and Radisele Junior Secondary school Centres of Sports Excellence however in the next few years will have talent identification centres across the country in order to give every kid an opportunity to fulfill their potentials.

Speaking during the launch the BFA general Secretary Mr Mfolo E.Mfolo proclaimed that the standards of school of excellence determines the output, and the output will give us the results that we want in 10 years from now.

“FIFA realized that the top countries in the world continue to make the gap big with other countries that’s when FIFA decided to embark on a talent development scheme to find out how other countries can play catch-up where FIFA Masters Alumni can fast track the development of players so that the junior national teams even small countries can make an impact in football”, said FIFA Consultant Mr. Serame Letswaka

Sharing the project landscape BFA Technical Director, Mr. Tshepo Mphukuthi emphasized that the project is not the same from country to country but is tailor-made to a country based on their country’s challenges and needs.

Closing the program proceedings, Hon. Tumisang Healy, a member of parliament for Gaborone Central, made it public that this program is dynamic and he believes it will change the football landscape of Botswana. He further added that if purposely do development, there will be outcomes out of it.