Our soccer administrators killing the sport

Editor, How right Daniel Kasule is. Rwandans are excited to watch the English Premier League, are glued to the television sets when Barcelona is playing Lionel Messi or Real Madrid plays Cristiano Ronaldo. But why can’t we develop our own Messis or Ronaldos?

Tuesday, March 05, 2013

Editor, How right Daniel Kasule is. Rwandans are excited to watch the English Premier League, are glued to the television sets when Barcelona is playing Lionel Messi or Real Madrid plays Cristiano Ronaldo. But why can’t we develop our own Messis or Ronaldos?The answer: lack of qualified football administrators.But I am optimistic Rwanda will get there. If you look at football powerhouses like Brazil, The Neitherlands, England, and Germany and so on, they invest in their players at an early age. They have leagues in primary schools, secondary schools and universities. They have leagues at the village level. Then the major teams will scout for the best players and deploy them to the lower divisions for further coaching.Those countries do not need to hire foreign coaches like Rwanda, because they train their own coaches. They have coach academies. Why can’t Rwanda do that? With all the money allocated to the sports ministry, it can be done. All the major teams can get involved.But if all that fails, then we try out cricket, basketball and athletics as we, meanwhile, watch football on TV.Michael Rwiyamilira, USAReaction to Daniel Kasule’s sports opinion piece, "Let us not prioritise since we are good at nothing.” (The New Times, March 4).