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Bosso eyeing foreign coach

Sport
HIGHLANDERS will engage yet another foreign coach for the 2015 Castle Lager Premier Soccer League season after the departure of Zambian Kelvin Kaindu

HIGHLANDERS will engage yet another foreign coach for the 2015 Castle Lager Premier Soccer League season after the departure of Zambian Kelvin Kaindu amid wide speculation that a mentor from South Africa is on his way to the fading Bulawayo giants.

FORTUNE MBELE/RONALD MOYO

Kaindu was forced out of Bosso in September following a 1-3 defeat to ZPC Kariba at Hartsfield leaving his assistant Mark Mathe in charge in the interim to the end of the season.

However, Mathe failed to guide Highlanders to a top-four finish, ending the season on fifth position.

That has forced Highlanders to look for another coach with a source yesterday confiding to this newspaper that Bosso are negotiating with a South African to take over from Mathe.

The source said the coach was supposed to attend Bosso’s last league match against Chapungu in Bulawayo but failed to make the trip due to some logistical problems.

While the source refused to give away the face of the coach, some names that have been thrown around for the Bosso hot seat are former AmaZulu coach Craig Roslee, Bloemfontein Celtic’s German coach Ernst Middendorp and former Maritzburg United coach Clinton Larsen.

Roslee parted ways with AmaZulu last month while Larsen was sacked by Maritzburg United at the beginning of the year making way for Steve Komphela.

Bosso chief executive officer Gumede hinted on Highlanders employing a foreign coach and yesterday confirmed he had received an application from a South African coach, but could not be drawn to reveal any names.

“I have an application from a South African coach, but obviously they would not want me to tell you they have applied. I actually have 10 applications. It is open and it is going to be a long process. We were not anticipating that our coach (Kaindu) would go,” Gumede said.

Earlier on Tuesday, Gumede said the philosophy of appointing former players to head the technical department was a thing of the past after he was asked about the Dynamos success with former player Kalisto Pasuwa and some European clubs who had succeeded under their former players.

Gumede said that was a phase that has passed at Highlanders as they realised the system of using former players was not bringing results and were now adopting a new system.

“It is them (European clubs) who copied from us. I can tell you that in the 1970s and 1980s we had people like Silas Ndlovu and James Nxumalo who used to play for the team and later on became coaches. Recently we had the likes of Methembe (Ndlovu), Rahman Gumbo, Madinda Ndlovu and Willard Khumalo who did that.

We are now adopting a new strategy. There is what is called cross pollination which will help us find new influence. Chances are high that we are hiring a foreign coach after the departure of Kaindu,” Gumede said.

In the recent past Bosso has employed two foreign coaches, Egyptian Mohamed Fathi and Kaindu, the latter being a former Highlanders player.