FIBA Africa this week organised a three-day FIBA Coach Instructors Level 1 course as part of the World Association of Basketball Coaches (WABC) project.
The event was held from July 19-21 in Abidjan, Cote d’Ivoire with 17 participants from 15 countries.
The course was supervised by FIBA coaching instructor Cheikh Sarr, who is currently head coach of the Rwanda national basketball team and Nour Amri of Morocco. The second edition of the course aimed at equipping National Federations with local instructors.
"FIBA is looking to develop many instructors on the continent but also around the world,” noted Amri.
Among the aspiring FIBA instructors were female coaches from three countries. Those coaches are Adoro Everlyne Kedogo (Kenya), Yosser Hedia (Tunisia) and Helina Randrianjatovo (Madagascar).
This year’s FIBA coach instructors course had household names like Aladji Dicko, who led Mali to two straight FIBA U-18 African Championships titles (2018 and 2020) and helped his country to reach the 2019 FIBA U-19 Basketball World Cup final.
Former Ivory Coast player who is now a coach Blaise Amalabian was also part of the course, which also counted the presence of former Rwanda head coach Moise Mutokambali.
Mutokambali, who currently serves as National Technical Director of Rwanda Basketball Federation (FERWABA), explained that his interest in the course focuses on helping coaches to develop their skills in the game.
"I really like development of the game, development of the players, but to have good players you have to have good coaches. And to have good coaches, it’s necessary to have good instructors. I am here to learn how to train coaches, and how to help the coach to develop their players.”
At the end of the FIBA Coach Instructors course, successful candidates are issued with a Level 1 instructor’s certificate.
FIBA Instructor Amri observed that those who "pass’’ will not only be coaches in their countries, but FIBA will also nominate them to run courses all over the world.
Amri noted that "so far we have 9 FIBA instructors in Africa FIBA WABC level 1 and we have two instructors: Coach Cheick and myself.”