Arendse explains why SA struggle to produce goalkeepers for the national team
Ex-Bafana Bafana goalkeeper Andre Arendse has outlined the reasons behind the challenge South Africa faces in developing top-notch goalkeepers like Ronwen Williams for the national team.
This comes after the Mamelodi Sundowns goal-minder, Williams, was nominated for the Ballon d’Or Yashin award as one of the top 10 best goalkeepers in the world.
The 68th edition of the Ballon d’Or awards ceremony were held on Monday, 28 October, at the Théâtre du Châtelet in Paris.
However, Argentinian shot-stopper Emiliano Martinez won the Yachine Trophy. The Bafana captain, Williams, was named ninth in the final rankings for Best Goalkeeper 2024 by Ballon d’Or.
ANDRE ARENDSE WEIGHS IN ON SA GOALKEEPING STRUGGLES
Arendse argues that instead of prohibiting foreign goalkeepers from competing in the South African top league, we should concentrate on creating initiatives to cultivate talented goalkeepers within the country.
The SuperSport United assistant coach went on to offer ideas on how this issue can be resolved moving forward.
“I think rather than speaking about goalkeeping from a foreign perspective, we have to speak about goalkeeping from a local perspective,” said Arendse.
“Goalkeeping is in a little bit of a crisis in South Africa at the moment. We are struggling to find goalkeepers to bring into the national team. Why is that? Because the development of goalkeepers has declined.
“We have to move from developing goalkeepers in isolated pockets. We need to bring all the leading minds in goalkeeping together under one roof. This will help us come up with a plan for how we are going to fix this on a national level.”
Arendse continued: “So, how do we do that? We have to develop proper and significant goalkeeper coaching programmes. That’s how you do it. We need to allow those coaches to go out and scout young goalkeepers. They will be able to train, develop, grow, and build them; that’s what we need.”
“Until then, we will always find ourselves in a situation where we don’t have enough quality goalkeepers.”
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