The football gods sure have a funny sense of humour! Vincent Phaladi Kobola quickly attests to that, especially when looking at how his career has panned out. Some 15 years ago, Ian Gorowa, in charge of Moroka Swallows, handed him his topflight debut.
The former Zimbabwe international recalls the day and the circumstances that led to him fielding the man popularly known as ‘Parks’. Kobola had been promoted by then Swallows mentor Gavin Hunt, who then loaned him out to second-tier side Winners Park.
They recalled him after a fine run with the national Under 23 side. Upon returning to The Birds’ nest, Gorowa had a crisis and needed someone to fill in at right-back. The date was 16 September 2007; the venue was Germiston Stadium. The greenhorn, Kobola, would line up alongside Bevan Fransman, Lefa Letsutsulupa and Mark Haskins.
“I had to give him a run because one boy [Ramahlwe Mphahlele] I used as a right-back was away on the day. I think he had an examination. I had to put Vincent [who had just returned from a loan spell with Winners Park]. He deserved it; it was a matter of time. He was very hardworking,” Gorowa, who now serves as a pastor in Johannesburg, tells FARPost.
“He never looked back; he just took that position and made it his own.”
Interestingly, Kobola recalls that his maiden appearance in the topflight was against Golden Arrows. Coincidentally, when Khurishi Mphahlele, the Baroka supremo, asked Kgoloko Thobejane to step aside late last month after a disastrous run of results, the young coach was called to step up. Just like the Gorowa episode. Guess who his opponent is: Abafana Bes’thende!
Baroka host Arrows at the Peter Mokaba Stadium on Wednesday evening at 17h00. “The coincidence is quite interesting. It’s as though it’s written somewhere. I’m not thinking twice about it,” Kobola tells FARPost.
Gorowa does not doubt that he will fight like a mad dog to save Bakgaga from the chop. They sit at the basement of the table with 16 points off 26 games. With four games remaining, they need to win all to avoid the chop.
The tough-as-teak Kobola, who hung his boots in 2018, would probably wish he were playing today. He would fight fiercely and bravely for the cause. But he has to instil that fighting spirit in a group of young men who have only picked four wins and six draws out of 26. He has to instil confidence in a talisman Evidence Makgopa, who has gone missing from the scoresheet for almost half a year.
But the leader of men, that is, Parks is confident he will be equal to the task. His stint at Cape Town City, the last club he played for, turned him into a man of the troops. “We had a week and a half of preparation, very positive. We saw videos [of Arrows], saw their weak points, and I’m happy with what I saw from the players during the week.
“We also had the privilege of having former Bafana Bafana captain Aaron Mokoena coming through to motivate the boys,” Kobola tells FARPost.
Eric Tinkler, who worked with him at City as a player, and at Maritzburg and Chippa United as his assistant, found him the ideal foil. In his former captain, he found a man who could be the glue holding the dressing room together while he concerned himself chiefly about tactics.
“What I saw is many young players always coming to him for advice, not just Cape Town City players, but players from other teams. I loved his management skills around the players,” Tinkler recently told FARPost.
“[When we joined Chippa] He understood when players were being mischievous because he was a professional player of recent high standards. I’m an old professional; players have changed their ways. He used to deal with that very well.”
With all that experience garnered over his 12 plus years of playing in the topflight, working under Tinkler and Thobejane, among others, as an assistant, he will have to hold Bakgaga together like glue.
Interestingly, he left Maritzburg in tears a few years ago, with a vague termination letter that didn’t do much explaining what his transgressions were. “He left Maritzburg in tears; he cried when bidding farewell to the players. We were told he was given a termination letter, and no one knew why,” a Maritzburg former player tells FARPost.
Coincidentally, his final game of the season will be against Maritzburg. Potentially, the result of that game could condemn the KZN side to relegation or even the playoffs, depending on the results of the following four matches.
The stone that the Maritzburg builders rejected would have been the stone behind their demolition. While he may not say it, that would be vindication for the budding coach who hails from Seshego, the biggest township in Limpopo.
