WINDHOEK – With court rumblings hogging the headlines in the local media, domestic football has been dealt a further blow with the untimely announcement that one of the most recognizable faces in the game has called it a day.
Namibia’s most decorated football coach since independence, Ali ‘Mr Fix It’Akan, has revealed to New Era Sports that he no longer enjoyed taking football teams through the ropes and resolved to quit the game for good.
A distraught Akan, 54, had long been pondering quitting the game and though he remains tightlipped on what prompted him to turn his back on the game, sources close to the socialite Akan say he is apparently fed up with having constantly been overlooked by football authorities to fulfill his long-term dream – coaching at national level.
“It’s not only Akan, a number of disgruntled local coaches with proven pedigrees share the same sentiments. The NFA lacks respect for established coaches with its unexplained persistence to randomly appoint inexperienced coaches from the lower divisions for the junior teams at our expense,” charged an irate local coach who requested his identity be withheld.
Akan is the only coach in the history of domestic football to have won league titles with three different clubs in the country’s flagship league – Blue Waters, Black Africa and Civics – since Namibia’s independence in 1990. He also won the Inland League title with AK FC in the South African highly competitive 2nd tier division and coached the Hardap Region team to victory in the annual Namibian Newspaper Youth Cup in Walvis Bay in 2006.
His impressive coaching resume landed him a lucrative job at Namibia’s best-supported football club African Stars, where he won two knockout cups and finished runner up in the race for the coveted MTC Premiership title in only his maiden season before he was unceremoniously booted from Diaz House for ostensible insubordination.
The much travelled mentor coached Orlando Pirates for a second spell this term and previously had stints with BA, Stars, Tigers, Ramblers, Blue Waters, Civics and City Pillars (SA) where he nurtured the raw talents of Sundowns midfield pair of Teko Modise and Hlopho Kekane during their formative years in the paid ranks.
Meanwhile, former Chief Santos midfielder-turned SKW mentor Lucky Kakuva has been installed as the new man to take over the coaching reins at the Ghosts.
By Carlos Kambaekwa
• ckambaekwa@newera.com.na