Retired Dutch coach Hans Van Der Pluijm - Photo Courtesy TFF Media.
Retired Dutch coach Hans Van Der Pluijm has opened up on interference in player selection by club management during his time in Ghana.
The 75-year-old spent over three decades in the West Africa Nation with coaching jobs across 12 different clubs since he retired as a goalkeeper. Some top clubs he handled during this period included, the defunct Kessben FC which metamorphosed into top flight side, Medeama SC.
His sojourn equally saw him handle Berekum Chelsea, Medeama SC, Heart of Lions, Feyenoord now West Africa Football Academy, Red Bull Soccer Academy (defunct) and Goldfields (defunct).
Van Der Pluijm recounted his time in Ghana with Pan Africa Football: “If you talk about the toughest, mostly the management doesn’t make the coach’s easy for them. Because they also want be involved in the team selection and you have to accept or you don’t accept it and that is one thing I never accepted.”
“Not all the clubs do that but some of them do that. I think of a club is asking for service of a coach, then you have to address his capabilities and you have to let them do the job. But if he cannot do it, then you take your action against [him].”
Van Der Pluijm spent some years in Tanzania with stints at Young Africans, Azam FC and the two Singida clubs. He gives an insight into how Ghana can rebuild its football from the grassroots level to the top.
“I think everything starts from the grassroots, it is the technical ability and the tactical ability, physicality and football has changed so much. [Football] is much more intensive, there is high intensity and you start with the youth, that is where it starts.”
The Dutchman’s coaching career has also seen him handle young clubs in the Netherlands, Den Bosch U18 and assistant to the senior side as well as Excelsior.
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