Former Kaizer Chiefs development coach Farouk Khan has delivered a brutal assessment of the state of junior football in South Africa, as he answers why players struggle to secure moves to big European clubs.
Burnley FC striker Lyle Foster is the only Bafana Bafana player currently plying his trade in the Premier League, while others are strewn over Portugal, Denmark, Norway, Cyprus and the German lower-tier. In the English Championship, Luke le Roux and Tylone Smith have struggled to make a mark at Portsmouth FC and Queens Park Rangers, respectively.
That is a far cry from the era where the likes of Quinton Fortune, Benni McCarthy, Lucas Radebe, Shaun Bartlett, Steven Pienaar, Aaron Mokoena, Pierre Issa, Bradley Carnell, goalkeeper Hans Vonk, Siyabonga Nomvethe and Delron Buckley were all domiciled in respected leagues in Europe at the same time.
In recent years, Major League Soccer [MLS] has also become the destination of talented players whom some feel can easily play in Europe. Khan has traced the difficulties to land deals with big clubs in Europe, to development structures and the grooming of players in South Africa.
‘OUR DEVELOPMENT IS NOT DESIGNED TO PRODUCE WORLD-CLASS PLAYERS, BUT JUST PSL PLAYERS’
“Some of the boys, when they wear the [reserve side] shirt, think they have arrived. They lose that hunger to go on and get to the top,” Khan told FARPost.
“Now you have a boy coming from Zambia, and he is prepared to do everything to reach the top. He works hard and achieves what he sets out to do in his career. Our boys don’t put extra time or extra work. Of course, there are those who put more time and work, but sometimes it has to do with the player himself, the individual.
“When I went to Chiefs the first time, I was shown the trophy room so that I could win with youngsters. I said you might have got the wrong man, winning at the expense of development.
“At the School of Excellence, they focus on pure development and winning is secondary. They don’t even look at Rele’s [Mofokeng’s] body as an issue or players of [Oswin] Appollis and [Mohau] Nkota’s sizes. It’s all about development.
“Our development is not designed to produce world-class players but just PSL players. I’m not criticising any club or any coach, but this is reality. That is why we no longer have players going to the big leagues in Europe. They only end in the PSL because they are not thoroughly trained to go further.”
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