CrimsonAvenger wrote:Yes. With Zimdoggy on how much we know about any of these guys who have coached us. Let us not look at this as a race thing. As an outsider and as someone who has nothing to do with either color, these have been my observations in the forums with respect to coaching staff:
1. You rarely see profuse praise showered on Butcher or Waller anyway.
2. The forum has been most critical of Kevin Curran's "let's earn respectability, not win" approach to coaching the national team.
3. The Pakistan test win is mostly attributed to Chatara, Hammy, Virori, and others, not to the coach who had taken over too.
4. Grant Flower was the only guy who received regular praise on the forums because people knew about his credentials and the news of his hard work was everywhere.
5. Heath Streak probably claimed more credit than he was given during his tenure as bowling coach and his handling of Querl at Tuskers ensured he doesn't get unconditional love too.
6. The only domestic coaches who have received a lot of respect in the forums are Gillespie and Brent and rightly so.
7. Again, the outburst is against the behaviour of Mangongo and not his coaching, which is an unknown anyway. Indeed, credit to him for spotting the talent in Elton, Prosper and co. No one is taking that away.
Hope this helps.
Spot on (and also agreeing with Zimdoggy about how much do we know).
On the other hand, there is a constant refrain from a lot of people closer to the action that the players are lazy, spoilt, complacent, and need a stern hand. I cannot possibly say how much truth is in there: Yes, you have BT who carries too much weight and loathes fitness tests, but isn't this the same guy who spent hours and hours with Grant Flower in the nets? It might have been GF's work ethic rubbing off, but I doubt he had to use any gross disciplinarian methods to lure him out of bed early in the morning.
When Waller became coach there was a lot of noise, from various quarters, about how he's a stern disciplinarian and exactly what the players need ... in fact much like after the Mangongo appointment. Reading a lot of comments here over the years along those lines, I have started wondering if people are not projecting their own experiences of growing up in what looks to me -- a complete stranger (and I might be totally wrong of course) -- like a rather stern and disciplinarian educational system (especially in the boarding schools) onto a group of grown men. "If you do not do as you are told, you'll get a caning!" What you need in this day and age, and what makes players and teams successful, is a working relationship between players and coaches, where discipline is bred by the mutual understanding of what is good for the group. There is of course a fine line between allowing players to feel relaxed and free to express themselves and too much laissez-faire, but that is the Art of Coaching ... and treading fine lines does not seem to be Mangongo's forte.
The one statement from Alan Butcher that stuck with me was how shocked he was when he took over that even the most senior players were palpably afraid to speak their mind, even when encouraged to do so. No wonder Zimbabwe has failed to groom captains who can think on their feet.
My 2cents from a corner of a foreign field ...