Itumeleng Khune(left) with his local coach Doctor Khumalo

In a recent interview with the media, South African, Premier Soccer league club, Kaizer Chiefs, number one goal keeper, Itumeleng made comments regarding the need for a South African coach to steer the Kaizer Chiefs ship. The shot stopper was speaking on behalf of he’s teammates when he said they were tired of European coaches who come and employ their European style discipline and mentality to their play. He then said a local coach can instill the “African Flair” that’s been missing in Kaizer Chiefs for some time. Now that’s a little confusing because even when Kaizer Chiefs did have a local steering the ship there was no evidence of African flair. All I saw was a field of eleven players passing the ball around and finding the back of the net on many occasions, which is really what we see a lot of in football because that is the whole point of kicking the ball around. Maybe I do not understand what he means by “African flair”, or maybe every continent has their flair. Maybe Asians have Asian flair, or there is Icelandic flair, it’s all very confusing because in football there’s the possession style of play/flair, where the team keeps the ball and denies the other team too much possession. And there’s the defensive style where the team relies on soaking up pressure and hitting the on the counter attack. So exactly what flair is Mr Khune talking about? Khune also talks about players being given “freedom to express themselves “in other words freedom to showboat. Really now Mr Khune if players where given that chance they would lose the ball easily to a team with discipline, a team who play straight forward football instead of being crowd pleasers. Sure that attracts fans but it doesn’t win you games.