Malawi 2004 - 2007

  Playing For England

       Better late than never

It was at the European Cup Final in 1967 that I finally gave up on my dream to play football for England. The centre forward for Manchester United was a year younger than me and, even though I had taken my boots I was not required . 

By luck a free day on a course in Blantyre gave me the opportunity to meet up with two F.A. coaches and Ben, the man who controlled the £10 million international development programme. 

Dave Puckett was in the Southampton team that had been runners-up in the old first division (Bruce please note). Steve was from Yeovil and once been the manager there. This was my chance to register the disappointment that had been festering for all these years. 

" Why did your F.A. systems fail to recognise my talent and project me into the England team. "

They shook their heads sadly, slowly stirred the ice in their drinks, and looked around for some diversion. 

" Can't you do something about it now?"

They changed the subject and suggested that I called-in to see the training session they were to take with Malawian youth coaches.

Now if I asked you for your vision of a football coach I suspect it would be similar to mine. Lots of shouting, a bit of swearing and bonhomie and sparing use of brain cells. Imagine my surprise when Steve began to explain the course to me.

" We cover cognitive development, learning styles and affective motivation, but, of course we had to adapt to the circumstances we found here. Actually we devised activities to suit the lack of equipment and cultural barriers."

Steve had built up his qualifications in a classic adult learning pattern through the Open University. I had not and returned to the point.

" Am I going to play for England or not?"

Steve weakened. 

" Come here at 4 o'clock and bring your kit."

I watched the rest of the session, which sure enough progressively built up a level of skill through small group practice to full match play. I took notes and scribbled diagrams that I thought might useful for my England debut.

I could hardly wait and arrived fifteen minutes early at the Kamuzu National Stadium, home of the Malawi national team and Bakili Bullets (quarter finalists in the African club championships). The stadium was unlike any I had seen before. For a start you drove underneath the floodlight pylon to the car park. Inside, the stadium looked as though it had started off trying to be the Maracana (Brazil ), but had run out of funding. There were six stands on three sides of the ground. Each reached high into the sky but was separated from the next by a large gap. It appeared that it would be easy for people to fall from the sides, especially since the game against Nigeria attracted 100,000 people crammed into space for 60,000. I imagined we might have similar problems once the ground started to fill.

Athletes were training on the pitch.

" That's Katherine Chikwakwa , she came second in the world junior games and was the star of Malawi's Olympic Team of six." She was frighteningly fast. I began to worry that my preparation was inadequate. Had I done enough speed work?

I struck up conversation with Eddie, a portly Malawian in a tracksuit. 

" I am the Technical Director for Malawi Youth Football. I used to be the coach for MTL Wanders (2nd in the league) and was coach of the national team recently. I never lost a match."

" Yes" I replied. "I have never been on a losing England side."

This was obviously part of the pre-match mind games that top coaches play to undermine the opposition. I felt mentally tough and prepared.

With only a few minutes to spare Dave and Steve arrived.

" Where's the kit?"

" Oh the strips and footballs never arrived. They're stuck in South Africa. Dave managed to get them Southampton strips and we bought some footballs locally."

So my debut for England against Malawi started at the National Stadium with us in tee-shirts and them in Southampton kit.

They were largely younger and fitter, but we had the experience. Dave and me - the midfield spine - had more than 100 years between us. The rest of our team was a mixture of BBC World Service wallahs , a Canadian, and a few passing Malawians, who presumably had English parentage. 

In spite of biased refereeing I touched the ball a few times and we came away with a creditable 3-3 draw away from home. 

I reminded Eddie that I had still not been on a losing England team and hoped that he had picked up a few tips for the coming World Cup qualifier against Tunisia. Perhaps that was a mistake. Malawi lost 7-0. 

Postscript

Ben told me that he had received a promise that 3 England players would arrive in June, but The Malawian F.A. was claiming to have no funds for the plane fares. He also waxed lyrical about supporting us in our lonely work. If we could afford to ship out footballs and kit he could get us some. This eventually finished up being a donation of 2 footballs before he left. 

To date I have not heard anything from Sven.

Later that same year.

It turned out that Gary Neville and Rio Ferdinand from Manchester United and David James from Manchester City were the footballers to visit Malawi. I received a call from DFID - the Department for Internatioal Developement (Could I help them to devise some HIV games to impress the footballers?) I quizzed the DFID woman about this trip. It turned out that the players were to fly in a chartered jet one day after the cup final with DFID staff who flew to England to accompany them. They would then spend two days in Malawi in luxury hotels before jetting off to the U.S. I asked her how many footballs and netballs this expense represented, given that all groups are constantly complaining that lack of simple equipment is their biggest problem. She reassured me that the costs had largely been sponsored from the U.K. 

It seemed that the event provided some publicity and sound bites, and the footballers were interested and genuine in their concern. I gave my place at the event to our young mzungo worker who was delighted to meet his Manchester City hero and felt we might use the contact in the future. I enjoyed the company of my first-born son on top of a mountain plateau instead. After all I was an England international myself.

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