AmaZulu Football Club is committed to playing its football part towards the notion of reviving Alexandra’s great sporting, cultural, and creative arts prowess whose history has fallen by the wayside over the years.
This was an undertaking given by the eThekwini side’s youth development technical director Ronnie Moroka in an interview with Alex News soon after his coaching clinic sessions at the Number 3 Square Grounds on 16 May.
His coaching sessions, which started at 8am and continued until 11am, were in partnership with the Alfred Maimane Phiri (Map) Games under its umbrella body, the Maimane Alex Development Foundation (MADF), the City of Johannesburg, and the Alexandra Northrand Local Football Association.
More than 150 U15 players, both boys and girls, from various clubs in the township that are affiliated with the Alex Northrand LFA participated in the coaching sessions, along with various local coaches from different clubs.
“We want to be part and parcel of the revival of Alex’s lost glory, especially on the football front, to ensure the township also takes its rightful place as one of the great soccer talent feeders to the beautiful game,” Moroka said.
“Talented youngsters can look forward to being scouted by Usuthu scouts to further their careers under the development sides of one of the clubs with a rich history of involvement in football spanning many years.”
Similar clinics have already been conducted in Soweto and others in Gauteng and their home province of KwaZulu-Natal. “We have a vision with club owners to make AmaZulu one of the greatest clubs in the country and that we can only achieve if we’re the first to identify talent and then nurture it for the club before others discover it.
“I am delighted with the unbelievable talent I witnessed here today. These players can look forward to being scouted to our structures in the future but they must keep working hard.”
Asked whether the club had come here to share their ‘muthi’ of success, Moroka said [Benni] McCarthy simply administered the right doses of tonic to awake the warrior in AmaZulu, and infused it with the elements of hard work, love of football, and devotion to the game, including a well-thought-out vision that was executable.
“That’s our only muthi of success, unfortunately. Our presence here is also to build the brand of AmaZulu in line with the vision of the new owners of the club. He wants the presence of the club to be felt even outside of the field of play.”
Map Games founder and Alex football legend of all time, Maimane Alfred Phiri said he and Ronnie [Moroka] have known each other for a long time since the day he walked into the offices of Jomo Cosmos to begin his career and then Moroka left for AmaZulu in KZN but they never lost contact.
“We will continue to work together for the betterment of football in our township,” Phiri said, adding that the Usuthu clinics had become an eye-opener for him and the other Alex legends who will get together to give of their time on a regular basis to conduct their own coaching clinics in the township.
Alex Northrand LFA secretary-general Malvin Khumalo welcomed the clinics, saying they will go a long way in assisting the U15s who have not kicked a ball for more than a year since the outbreak of Covid-19.
“We are hugely indebted to the Usuthu side for hosting the clinics for these kids and their coaches. The fact that the clinics included the coaches makes the program even more effective as the coaches will carry the knowledge to those players who could not make it due to Covid-19 protocols that limit the participation numbers,” he said.
