Contrary to beliefs in some quarters
that Malawi coach, Tom Saintfiet, will hit back at Nigeria and hope to
embarrass the Super Eagles when he leads the Flames to Calabar for the
crucial World Cup qualifier on September 7, the Belgian rather expresses
respect for the African champions and their coach, Stephen Keshi.
Saintfiet has every reason to be angry
with the Nigeria Football Federation after being offered the job of the
technical director last year only to be denied the job three weeks later
following the intervention of the Minister of Sports, Bolaji Abdullahi.
The NFF has since appointed former Nigeria coach, Shaibu Amodu, as the technical director.
“I don’t have any bad feeling towards
Nigeria or the Nigerian FF. I love Nigerian football. I took the Malawi
job because I want to try to make a miracle come true, qualifying Malawi
for Brazil 2014. If the last match was against Ghana, Algeria or
Swaziland I would have taken it with the same pleasure and motivation,”
Saintfiet told us in an email.
“Nigeria are the champions of Africa, a
powerhouse in African and even in world football so it won’t be easy
(playing against them). Keshi is a good coach and can select top local
and foreign-based players. It won’t be easy but every match has to be
played. Everything can happen in these 90 minutes.
“We respect the technical team and the
players but we don’t focus on it. The fact that Malawi is only two
points behind after five games shows that Malawi has also good players
and good coaches.
“If the biggest teams always win,
football wouldn’t be fun anymore; all over the world you see surprises.
We focus only on our mission, what we have to do to have a chance to be
successful.”
Saintfiet, who has been coaching since
1997 and has handled five national teams in the period, said he has
never been motivated by money in his job. He was reportedly demanding
$10,000 bonus if he beats Nigeria but he insisted the World Cup ticket
is more important than the cash.
He said, “Money is never my motivation, I
get so many offers, also from clubs in Europe, I’m the highest
qualified coach in Africa, have the UEFA PRO License, a degree in
Business and Sports Psychology and a physical coaching degree. I
frequently get offers from clubs who play European Cup football, all
over Europe. The same happens in Asia and Africa but I’m only 40 years
old, I have a dream, the reason I ever came to Africa was not because I
have no options in Europe but it was because I have the dream to go once
with an African country to the World Cup.
“Money has never been my motivation. If
that was the motivation, I took many times the wrong decisions. But I
always take decisions about where I want to work with my heart. So bonus
or no bonus, I don’t care, I think it’s good to give the money to youth
development in Malawi.
“I want to try to win this match and if
we succeed, we focus on the play-offs and the most beautiful bonus I
could get from Malawi is that my boys qualify for the World Cup.
“I think too many people in Africa are
focused on money. They think that all coaches are only here to fill
their pockets. Sure, there are foreigners and local coaches who only
think about money, but not all. Just as you have bad foreign and good
local coaches, you also have good foreign and bad local coaches. You
can’t simply generalise.
“I love coaching national teams because
in my eyes serving a country is the highest you can achieve, and to
achieve my goal, the World Cup, you need to be a national team coach.
The Belgian has only taken charge of the
Flames in less than two months but he is confident that the team have
garnered enough experience to match up with the Super Eagles in Calabar.
“I arrived in Malawi seven days before
the COSAFA Cup, I didn’t make the selection of players, I met the full
squad two days before the first game. I had to screen the players and
teach them tactics and two days later we conceded a clear and proven
offside goal, a soft red card after 43 minutes and still we played 1-1
against Zimbabwe,” he said.
“Again two days later we lost 3-2
against Angola, the team played well but some people made crucial
mistakes. We missed more than 10 foreign-based pros at the COSAFA and I
didn’t have the chance to see the local players. Now six weeks later we
made huge steps, the Rwanda match (which Malawi won 1-0) was the first
match I made the selections, we added the foreign-based players and some
local-based players,
“Together with my local coaching staff,
we built a team, which will be competitive to play Nigeria. COSAFA was
good for me to observe, Rwanda was good to try out, now the real job
comes, (to beat) Nigeria.”
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