Mathiot appointed football director-New coaching cadre for The Pirates |13 March 2008
The former Seychelles and St Louis midfielder who also had a stint as coach of the country’s national team, has already drawn up a performance development scheme which involves different levels in football development – grassroots, regional, academy (young players), youths and seniors.
Elsie Ernesta is responsible for women’s football development and Damien Jean has the responsibility of overseeing the grassroots football development. Those two programmes fall under the technical support section which is also responsible for players’ development and football education.
Mr Mathiot noted that in structured football there exist two main goals – development and performance.
He explained that development is a process and it has different stages. Young players learn the basics of football and follow different training programmes according to their ages so that they develop into good quality players.
As for the performance goal, he said that it is an event. He took the example of the country’s national team – The Pirates – who will soon start preparing for the African qualifiers of the 2010 World Cup to be held in South Africa.
“When we talk about performance, a national team coaching staff don’t have time to correct players’ mistakes.
This is why it is important for players to have acquired the necessary skills within their clubs so that the national team coaching staff just works on the playing strategy. Players called to the national team should be able to perform,” said Mr Mathiot.
The Pirates’ coaching cadre
As football director, Mr Mathiot is also involved with The Pirates’ set-up. In fact, he has already drawn up the team’s training plan as well as those for the country’s under-16 and under-17 teams who are preparing for two different assignments.
Instead of having a head coach, the SFF has decided that a panel of Seychellois coaches should work with The Pirates and the young Seychelles teams. On the panel are coaches who will do specialized jobs – Danny Laurette (work with goalkeepers), Cliff Nolin (work with defenders), Vivian Bothe (physical trainer), Roger Labonté (work with midfielders) and Ralph Jean-Louis (work with strikers).
All five coaches will also have to train the country’s other male and female teams with the help of Michel Renaud, Gavin Jeanne, Patrick Cafrine (youth football), Rodney Choisy and Elsie Ernesta (women’s football).
Swedish Jan Mak, who came here earlier this year with his team IF Elfsborg, is to arrive at the start of May to oversee the work being done by the panel of coaches and to act as technical advisor during the forthcoming matches.
The Pirates’ first group nine match of the African qualifiers of the 2010 World Cup which have been combined with the preliminaries for the African Nations Cup finals, is away against Burundi during the weekend of May 30 to June 1.
The following weekend (June 6-8), they will host Tunisia. Burkina Faso will play here on the weekend of June 13-15, before The Pirates travel to the western African country for the return match on the weekend of June 20-22.
After hosting Burundi on the weekend of September 5-7, The Pirates’ last fixture will be against Tunisia during the weekend of October 10-12.
“I’m confident in the structure which has been put in place and it is expected that in two years’ time, we could have better players who will know their roles on the pitch. With the development of players having taken place, the national team (The Pirates) will not have to train players, but polish their playing styles so that everyone gel on the team. While the technical cadre is responsible for performance, the players are responsible for getting the results. The senior players know that they owe the SFF, their employers and Seychellois football fans a lot for not getting the results expected of them in recent years. It is time everyone gets down to some positive thinking about where we want Seychelles football to go,” said Mr Mathiot.
The players called for training with The Pirates are Nelson Sopha, Ricky Rose, Eugene Valentin, Vincent Euphrasie (goalkeepers), Bernard Rose, Verna Rose, Godfrey Denis, David Dorby, Bertrand Esther, Harry Libanotis, Ronny Hoareau, Steve Henriette, Jones Joubert, (defenders), Denis Barbé, Etienne Jean, Jonathan Bibi, Armantal Ernesta, Henny Dufresne, Roderick Rose, Archille Henriette (midfielders), Colin Laporte, Mervyn Mathiot, Philip Zialor, Don Anacoura, Yelvanny Rose, Alex Nibourette and Norvil Gaspard (strikers).
Junior Pirates get ready
Other than the senior national team, two youth sides are already preparing for different competitions. The under-16 team, who are training four times weekly, are to participate in the Eighth African Under-17 Championship qualifiers and they will play Reunion away during the weekend of April 11-13. The return leg match has been scheduled for the weekend of April 25-27 at Stad Linite.
Because most of the players on the Junior Pirates team are not involved with club teams, they will play in the Barclays League division three.
As for the under-17 team, they are getting ready for the forthcoming sixth edition of the Jeux de la Commission de la Jeunesse et des Sports de l’Océan Indien (CJSOI) which Seychelles is to host from July 27 to August 2.
If the team win the football competition of the Jeux de la CJSOI, they will participate in the Cosafa U17 tournament later this year.
It is worth noting that a girls’ team, coached by Elsie Ernesta and Rodney Choisy, are also preparing for the Jeux de la CJSOI.
G. G.