Botswana is among three Southern African countries who meet the Confederation of African Football (CAF) A criteria coaching courses standards.
Of the three, Botswana and Mozambique fully comply while Lesotho has been stated to be waiting to be certified. This means coaching courses conducted in Botswana fully meet the standards set by CAF.
In 2015, CAF summoned a coaching convention to review and standardise coaching content across the continent. As a result, the continental football body halted all CAF coaching courses for this process to take place.
According to Botswana Football Association (BFA) Technical Director (TD) Tshepo Mphukuthi, the convention was directed by CAF development division. It was attended by technical directors and coach educators from CAF affiliates across the continent.
Upon the conventions completion in 2019, there were eight application procedures and requirements in the application process to be met by each Members Association (MA).
The criteria required MA’s to have, Technical department structure ( names, titles, qualifications and responsibilities), Course program and Detailed Syllabus, which includes practical and theoretical content. MA’s were to further produce presentation slides for each topic, Examination procedure, Coach Education Action plan, Head of Education: Name and CV, Coach educators Names and CV’s and lastly a Coaching Education system.
Since the inception of the standardisation process, Botswana worked hard to qualify and now meets these requirements. As a result, the country complies ‘to conduct CAF A and B coaching license courses,’ which many countries in the region are still yet to achieve.
“Because we meet all the eight procedures, we can apply for CAF D, C, B and A license courses. We are currently running the third CAF course this year. In the last two years, we have managed to issue out CAF A License which has been completed and certificated, CAF C License which has been completed but awaiting certificates while CAF B License is currently ongoing and is left with the last phase,” the BFA TD says.
Mphukuthi further states that the association also went further than the convention to establish coaching courses across the country. These courses, he says, will cater for all structures, with particular focus to developing coaches and regional structures. This allows the association to conduct as many courses as possible within the country at the same time giving the coach educators opportunity to practice and develop. The BFA TD believes meeting the CAF standards will help the country produce top quality players in the future. “Football is like a school, the more quality teachers or coaches you have, the better the quality of students and or players. We need to develop highly qualified coaches in all our structures: youth, women, regional leagues, national leagues and national. It is then, that we can talk about winning international competition. It a long journey that needs endurance, perseverance, and total commitment,” he says.
