Mr. Sniebly’s lovely life skills

That’s right we’re back again! We left you last time having just begun our life skill competition, which is now in full swing. We delegated control of the project to our German friend Robin (Bieber/ Schweinsteiger= Biebsteiger if you remember), although we now call him Mr Sniebly because we think it sounds German and because we liked him from the film School of Rock! A very ignorant British approach, but he doesn’t seem to mind too much, in fact we think he kind of likes it! Anyway we have been progressing nicely with the life skills with activities ranging from Ultimate Frisby (a good under 17’s warm up), 4 legged races (involves 4 people but legs tied together), marshmallow eating (that’s what it says on the tin really) and electric fence dodging. No not real electric- like we’re sure you are thinking, just a metaphoric piece of rope in which the kids had to jump over without touching. Anyway, as well as being fun they really do have real meanings and extremely important lessons to be learnt from and applied to everyday life. The sessions involve the fun activity, us taking some photos and then a detailed discussion on how the kids interpreted the session in relation to skills used in everyday life. There are over 30 which has been a challenge to say the least, but with Sniebly’s great enthusiasm we are almost finished and hopefully first to do so.

Mr Sniebly's life skill

We have also started sessions with old BRIGHTon and Hove Albion, no sorry his real name is- always look on the BRIGHT side of life! Ok enough with the poor name jokes, we have started at our Zimbabwean friend Bright’s school sessions and the first session was an event to say the least! We turned up at his voluntary school/derelict church bang on time, as all professional coaches do, expecting to have about 20 kids and a nice pitch to play on as Bright had promised to arrange a nice pitch at another local secondary school. How very wrong we were. He gave us a tour of the classrooms first which are scattered in the small areas surrounding the church and within the church itself, separated by blackboards. Therefore whilst one class is doing algebra, another is learning countries of the world, whilst another is doing some spellings. Quite a shock for us to see so many classrooms in so little space with so many kids it appeared. Bright told us that he had been strict and sent a lot of kids away because he just didn’t have the capacity for any more. He then went outside to ring the bell for assembly. When we say bell, it was a large piece of tin roofing hanging on a piece of rope tied to a tree. He hit it several times with a large wooden branch and the kids came scampering. They were extremely polite but in unison (literally every child) said, “good morning”, so we replied “good morning, how are you?” They then shouted “fine thanks and how are you” back at us, leading us to a strong conclusion that they all spoke English. Again how very wrong we were!

The pitch at Brighton and Hove's pitch/ church

Bright introduced us at the 3 Mzungo’s (not quite musketeers) and then assigned Will with grades 2, 3 and 4, and Meggo with grades 5, 6 and 7. So he did us a great favour there leaving the tiny tots of grade 1 at the side to watch as avid spectators. Therefore we had 60 kids between us on a pitch (not the one he had promised) which ran alongside the church and was basically made of rocks. Will was so shocked that he expressed his concern to the teachers that if a kid was to hit their head on one of the many small mountains, they would in fact die! This didn’t really bother them though and they were just eager to get going with some football. The pitch was tiny and to put it into context it was probably a bit smaller than an 18 yard box at Emirates stadium. So as you can see an extremely challenging debut and we can quite easily say the HARDEST 1 hour session of our lives! However like all great (and we mean great) coaches do, we pulled out some relays, dribbling races (although many balls hit small mountains and went off the sides of the church down its steep sides, as it is situated on a very high hill) and some turns drills. We then had a small tournament at the end which was fun until Bright and his deputy head master Succeed (yeah you could have guessed a name like that) started offering 20 Metacais as financial reward to the winning team. They then decided to have a bet between themselves on who would be the winning team. Before we get onto that rather concerning matter, just thought we’d throw some other interesting names we’ve found over here. Obviously there’s Hard Life (David really) and then there was a guy called ‘It doesn’t matter’ to which Meggo replied, “Ok I won’t tell you my name then,” when he first met him.

Good morning and how are you?

Oh yeah back to the more concerning issue of the two teachers betting on the outcome of under 12’s football. Basically they took a team each in the final and decided that the winner would win a drink and probably some money off of the other. However the final was a draw and went to penalties. Therefore each team had 3 penalties each, typically these were all missed and because we were over running on time we suggested that the next team to miss would be the loser. We did this and thought we had a winner until Succeed went absolutely mental as his team was the losing team. He shouted, jumped up and down at us and spat quite a lot into our faces. We were forced to continue with penalties because he made up some rubbish like the keeper was off his line, and again as expected his team finally won the whole charade. Therefore it was quite an experience on top of an entertaining experience in the first place.

Outdoor classroom at Bright's school

However on a more serious note we gave the teachers a talking to at the end and explained the errors of their ways. They took it very well and apologized to us over and over again, but it just highlights the importance of educating people out here on how to be responsible and a positive role model to kids. This is our main concern out here and the strong point we have emphasized on our coaching course to the first team players. Overall a great experience because the kids, who appeared to have never played football before (we guess this as they didn’t know how a match worked) had a great time, sang fantastic Arsenal songs (I like Eboue, boue) and got fit at the same time.

The other big event which stands out as a true highlight of the whole Mozambican experience was a trip to Pingi’s (Pingu for comedic effect) house in Chimoioi. Cimoioi is the big town/city in the province of Manica and about 45 minutes away from the club. However it took about 1 hour in one of the ‘death traps’ they call Chappa’s out here (the taxi bus). This was the start of our adventure with; us, Sniebly and Hard Life all wedged onto the back seat of the Chap, made to fit 3 people. The public transport system has no bounds though it appears with about 25 people squeezing tightly like crisps in a packet. Some sitting, some standing, some bent, some on people’s laps and others with their bums hanging out the open windows. When people want to get somewhere here though, how they squeeze onto these things. The boot was also open and tied with some string. So we all got whiplash to our necks and couldn’t twist them for a few days, well we still can’t really move them now!

Electric fence and Sniebly

We arrived in the market of Chimoioi to find Pingi and two other players who live there, Manino and Mario (self-proclaimed Messi). Pingi was and is so proud of his roots and from the moment we left the Chap treated us like royal guests. He bought us some crisps and water before showing us some land marks, such as the radio station, cinema (not really a cinema to you and us), market, football grounds and centre of town. We then moved swiftly onto his auntie’s house which was a large pink building just off of the main road. The house seemed quite small, but large for Mozambique and had endless amounts of cousins, nephews and nieces to meet inside. Oh and about 14 dogs! They were all extremely kind and gave us some bananas and oranges as a warm up to the day. The fun was just about to start.

Inside a reasonably empty chap

We jumped on the back of an open truck in which Pingi’s cousin drove us down some very tight back passages and far away from the main town. This was the true Chimoioi. After just about surviving not falling out of the truck due to the, well to be polite tricky terrain, we were dropped just short of Pingi’s house. The poverty and tough, tough living conditions in Mozambique was clear. The house was small but extremely well built by Pingi and his brother. There were holes in the walls, no windows and the roof was improvised to say the least but it’s what Pingi and his family call home. We were taken back and in awe of how people survive, let alone live in such conditions. The toilets are deep holes outside (unbearable conditions for you know what in the winter), the kitchen is a small open brick building and bedrooms are very tiny, dark bricked areas. However the family spirit is something to admire. They have a small area with 4 small chairs (1980’s leather) and a TV with 3 fuzzy stations. This is the hub of their family life and Pingi told us that when he goes home the whole family huddle in this area and enjoy each another’s company. He also had an old wireless set up which he played in his small dining area to which we ate an exquisite meal at a miniature table. His mum was extremely kind cooking heaps of Sadza, spaghetti, chicken, home made potatoes and coconut mixed with green vegetables. We were stuffed and had the best meal (we must say best Sadza) in 3 months out here. We met the whole family and took photos of Pingi and them in front of their house, even including their tiny little pet kitten. The family was so proud of their house and so grateful to us for visiting, although we were the ones who were humbled and the ones who are eternally grateful for the experience and hospitality offered to us.

Random picture of our U16's with manager Chitty Chitty Chibanga in Chimoioi

We then left the house and got a bus down the dirt road (which they classify as a real road, we’re not sure about that) and traveled to another densely packed area of improvised houses deep in the heart of the back streets of Chimoioi. We visited and saw Mario, Simaozinho and Lloyd’s houses (all GDM first teamers) who gave us a great insight into real life in Mozambique and were very kind in their hospitality. The thing that humbled us the most is the pride they hold in their homes, their memories of great childhood’s growing up there and how they are constantly dreaming of earning enough money to pay back their families. This is either through money or building new homes for them, it is really inspirational. It is from just 1 day in a small area like this that our view of life changed and changed the way we approach our own lives when we return home. It was a truly amazing and positive experience.

Short in snooker action, shame Meggo beat him!

Finally we visited the manager’s house, old Miguel Morinihou, who invited us especially because he heard we were in the town. They treat us with such respect for basically just being from a totally different world and wanting to help. He was a great host giving us bread, crisps and drinks before showing us photo albums upon albums of his career photos. There were photos of him representing the Mozambique national team against a range of teams like Portugal, Bulgaria and Zambia. Again we didn’t know the true man he was until he opened up his ‘real life’ to us. We are used to seeing the fiery and arrogant management side to him, but deep down he is a family man living with his wife and eldest daughter. He is proud of what he has achieved in football and eager to show us and the first team players that were with us, what he lives for- football. So after a full day out in Chimoioi we headed back into the sunset on a Chappa with Hard and Sniebly. A day we will never forget for the rest of our lives.

Again random picture of minnies sister- Chandulia

Gallos have also been busy winning 2 matches since our last blog. The first was on a very strange pitch to say the least which slanted quite steeply down hill and had large bore holes scattered all over the place. We won the game 1-0 with Meggo missing a penalty only for Fat Boy to scuff the rebound and Will to finally slot home on the 3^rd attempt. Meggo also went on to miss 3 penalties at the orphanage in the same week. A real low point in his time here and it’s knocked his confidence quite severely. However if another penalty does arise, he will be willing to take it, just so he can complete the Mzungo triangle of goal scorers! The second match was against the ‘moody Spurs’ outfit of Vumba who we drew 0-0 with in the first week. This time we couldn’t control ourselves and won comfortably 2-0. Spurs didn’t have 1 shot really and the 2 strikers smelt like they were drunk, as reported by the Laurent Koscielny wannabe- Meggo. The game was quite fiery though with tackles flying in everywhere and Meggo getting kicked in the head when trying to head a ball at literally ground level. Quite a stupid way of defending we reckon!

Our U17's and girls at 7 in the morning

The first team have had mixed results with a shocking 2-1 loss to the team that are currently 4^th in the league at home. Miguel was shell shocked and had an intense week of training to get the boys back in good routine. The players themselves do not like losing and took it very hard as they are not used to it. Their attitude changed remarkably and last weekend we beat FC Shoprite 6-1, with about 27 one on one’s being missed by Flex alone. He’s the El Hajj Diouf look a-like. However the performance was much improved and because of results elsewhere we have a crucial match with the top team TextAfrica this Sunday at Campo Municipal. They are 2 points clear on the same games and we MUST win to be in contention for the title. There are only 3 games left after this match and it is vital we approach the game with the right mentality. That’s currently what Miguel is working on around camp now, they are really focused on beating the African text message!

The 6-1 mawling of FC Shoprite in Chimoioi

That is probably quite enough for one day’s reading so we’ll leave it there and write one more blog before we leave for England. We have a feeling that last blog will be very interesting as we are going on Safari in Gorongosa National Park- alone! Well we say alone but Zambo, Joanna, Pingi and Sniebly will be with us in the red love bug. Lets see it as a promising adventure! Oh yeah and Meggo might shave again, it's been 5 weeks! Until next time, take care blog fans out there!!!!!!!!

Arsenalllll!!!!

The Mzungo Triangle!

And then there were 3 of us! A German named Robin (Van Persie, for comedic effect) has joined us in Manica to create a dynamic triangle of what the natives here call MZUNGO’s (white people)! His English is impeccable and to describe him briefly would be best by saying he is a combination of Justin Bieber and Bastion Schweinsteiger. Anyway it has created great excitement at the club and even greater euphoria when we all donned the red strip of Gallos! Meggo was in his normal Koscielny (centre back) role, whilst Robin was given a surprise start to his Mozambican career in the centre of midfield. Will was finally “back in the ground” as our old pal Amade Balotelli used to say, after 7 weeks on the sidelines due to his sending off on our debut. Some of those weeks were due to games being postponed, so he wasn’t actually banned for 7 weeks, his crime wasn’t that bad! However he was left on the bench to start with as Pingi and Hardlife (new management team) started Fatboy and Short (head of transport) up top. The game started promisingly with Gallos missing some early chances and dominating possession. It was then the turn of Mzungo 1 (Biebsteiger) to make his name in the record books. He went through one on one with the keeper, dodged being tackled by his own player Short, who was clumsily running back from an offside position, and slotted the ball home in glorious style. The crowd of at least 50 erupted with delight as Meggo ran up to celebrate shouting “Mzungo, Mzungo, Mzungo” and Will chanting it back with the rest of the crowd!

2 members of the triangle

Things then turned sour, as an Adrian Bikey lookalike who was partnering Meggo in defence got sent off with 2 yellows in about 24 seconds. The referee was also the one that sent Will off all those weeks ago and was back at his finest to send Bikey packing after just 30 minutes of play. This didn’t worry Pingi though as he left 3 at the back and wanted us to keep going forward for goals. The opposition in moody purple Inter Milan strips from 1995 then equalised as Meggo passed the ball to the left back who wasn’t there, but off the pitch changing his boots! Then quite soon after Waru Waru (not Waka Waka) banana kicked the ball Roberto Carlos style into the roof of the net on the volley, although it did look like it came off his knee cap. Fat Boy then scored a third just before half time with some lovely work from Simao (big friendly giant) down the wing, who cut it back perfectly for Fats to smash home.

Happiness which makes us happy!

It was 5 minutes into the second half when the ‘Triangle’ was complete; Will was “back in the ground.” He was then sent off 2 minutes later by his referee friend- NATTTTTTTTT! A corner was floated to the back post where Will volleyed first time like Paulo Di Canio into the bottom right corner (as you can tell the volley wasn’t perfect and neither was the goalkeeping). The celebration was something truly special and one the people of Manica will never forget. All 3 triangle members ran to the corner creating 3 triangles with our fingers and chanted MZUNGOooooaaaaaallllllllllllllllll. Sad but true we're afraid!Gallos then defended superbly with Meggo as commander of his back 3, including Titcho, an IT teacher who really wanted to be the goalkeeper with how deep he was defending! The 10 men came home with a fine 4-1 win and marched up the league to third. This all came on the same day as our GDM (Grupo Disportivos de Manica) girls and under 16’s won league games after our superb training regime throughout the week. The girls won convincingly 5-1 to go top of the league, with Sharon standing out with 2 goals which could easily have been 10. The U16 boys won 2-0 in Chimmoioi against FC Shoprite and set a very happy mood around the club with 3 wins in one day.

Kissing the ball

We must quickly mention the most major event in our 9 week stay to date. The arrival of 30 new footballs! It was the most exuberant we had been for ages and Mr Mann (Nelson Mannnnnnndela) made us perform a photo shoot with the shiny new balls. These included photos of Pingi laying on the floor and the balls being poured all over him, photos of us kissing the new balls and us generally having a fun time throwing them around. Thanks must go to Zambia who sent them about 5 weeks ago and Arsenal for funding them. We are using about 18 at the moment with the equipment manager Rafa (Benitez, you just knew that was coming) putting the rest into storage for the future.

He's grown another head, no seriously what took the balls so long?

The other big event of the last 2 weeks was the GDM and Emirates cup held at Anda orphanage. We had 6 teams turn up with each team entering an under 11’s, under 14’s and girls team, which as you can imagine meant there were hundreds of excited kids on a reasonably small pitch. It was also the chance of the first team players/coaches to be mini Arsene Wengers for the day and try and win pride for their teams. We had Lloyd (Mayweather) in charge of GDM youth, Chitty Chitty Chibanga in charge of Academicas, Shadreck Scooby Doo with his Congresso rabble, Alex and Abu with GiantKillers, the stupidest man alive but very nice Manuel with Costo Do Sol, Anda orphanage with no management and Ruben with his sidekick Cretin managing GDM girls. The day was a great success with 5 pitches being set up with group stages being played before thrilling finales. Zambo was chief time keeper and score master in the centre of the pitches and controlled things reasonably well in his pyjama bottoms (claiming they were stylish trousers). The U11’s winners were Lloyd’s GDM, girls Ruben’s GDM and U14’s Shadrecks Congresso, fantastic for the kids in those teams. However everyone went home happy with player cards for everyone, bread rolls, biscuits, bananas and juice after the event. Well we say everyone was happy but the players that got Bendtner player cards immediately wanted to swap for Sagna, Song or Eboue. One even asked for Messi, we wish!!!!

Lloyds winning team and Hardlife getting over excited at the GDM Emirates cup!

The other huge, very important event which happened during the tournament was the visit of the president of the Mozambique Football Association (MFA) who was visiting Manica and GDM. Therefore we had pressure on our young shoulders to make the tournament an aesthetically pleasing event to which he would be impressed. We gave all the players/coaches/referees Arsenal shirts to wear so it looked as professional as possible. He interviewed us on why we were in Mozambique, what we wanted to achieve, what we thought were the main problems concerning the country’s football and seemed to want to give us a lot of information on his opinions. The most important aims for the country in the next few years are to identify the young talent and provide them with football boots (however basic) as early as possible. The problem arises when a child is given his/her first pair of boots at the age of 14 or 15 and their feet can’t adapt to wearing them due to their feet becoming flat. Further concerns were to increase the physical strength of players in Mozambique, which is extremely tough due to great poverty, poor nutrition and lack of equipment/facilities to do so. The president was very impressive though in what he wanted to achieve, sooner rather than later, and had a great passion to want to move football forward in the country. We gave a good account of ourselves and were being filmed whilst doing so. Not sure what or where the video will go though! He was also kind enough to give us some footballs, new bibs and when Meggo cheekily asked for some goal nets, he actually agreed. He then left in his 4 x 4 with his many dignitaries and seemed reasonably impressed with our days work, although he did only see 15 minutes of action.

I'm a little teapot short and stout!

We have also been busy with a life skills competition with our many groups. These are fun games and activities with deeper meanings we talk about afterwards. The main topics are communication, respect, trust, safe sex education, unity and diversity. For example a game we played with the U17’s and girls was called ‘perfume’. It involved secretly spraying aftershave onto one players hand and them shaking 4 or 5 other player’s hands. We then asked them to all smell their hands and whether they noticed the smell or not. The main learning point was how easy it is to pass things to one another, such as diseases through intercourse. Hard Life then pulled out his weapon of mass destruction- a condom! All the kids giggled a bit but when we spoke seriously to them they fully engaged with the topic and hopefully learnt very important lessons. We certainly did anyway! Other games are simple like; rock, paper, scissors, hand slaps, broken telephone and stuck in the mud. Out of the 30+ there are, we have done about 10 in the last week and are racing to do them all first with other groups, a fantastic idea from Schalk, the main man behind everything good that happens here at GDM.

Life skill- Guess the leader

Our other sessions are still in full flow and the last 4 weeks set to be the most hectic yet. Pingi has added 2 further schools and a longer academy session on Saturdays to our programme and we are literally buzzing about from 6.30 in the morning until our last session finishes at 7.30 in the evening. The academy is the more talented youngsters from all the local kids’ teams, as chosen by Ping dog. Our English and computer lessons have been improving with greater attendance and positive work being achieved. The players are creating PowerPoint’s to show what they do when they are off the field. For example, coaching kids, gardening, cleaning at the club, learning English and refereeing. They are learning vital computer skills and also enhancing the motto of the club, ‘more than just a player’. They have also been learning internet skills since it came back last week, although as we write it’s gone off again! Some have set up Facebook accounts to communicate with friends and others just emails or learning how to use websites. In English the players love starting with a word search and racing each other to finish first. We then do very basic stuff like; weather, family, food, greetings etc, so they can start picking up basics. They also enjoy a game where we go through the alphabet trying to name football teams or players with that letter. We shouldn’t laugh but some of their pronunciations are hilarious for certain letters. They also love to swear and most of the English they learn revolves around sexual words. Great teaching we feel!

Lloyd and Gabby 'Agbonlahor' in english lesson

The player coaching course is going well with Biebsteiger turning up to learn drills for when we leave. He has no coaching experience really but has a good manner with kids and can do a great job with sufficient drills. The players have started making detailed notes and diagrams of what we are showing them, which is encouraging. We have also created a pack of notes on Waka Waka’s laptop in which they can use as a resource.

Furthermore we have met a great guy from Zimbabwe called Bright. He fled from Zimbabwe for his life leaving his wife and 2 kids at home to escape being killed. This was due to him being a teacher and Robert Mugabe believing he was teaching against what he wanted people to hear. Bright has 3 degrees from university and has 2 passions in life, to teach and secondly for the care of humans. He has no money and is a voluntary head master at a school he has made out of a derelict church, which the priest was kind enough to give him. He has Zimbabwe kids attend from all parts of Manica and runs the school with purely voluntary teachers and through donations. We felt impelled to help such a great guy, who didn’t once ask for help but just told us about his mission. We have given him pens, paper, pencils, chalk and Arsenal worksheets which has really made his world. We have also offered to do a 2 hour session for him every Monday morning which has excited the kids beyond words and given him an old football for the kids. It’s amazing how in such extreme cold in the mornings to these African kids, they still turn up at 7 am in bare clothing to play football with their friends. However their one ball was in dreadful condition and falling apart. It cost them 2 Metacais to pump up after just 1 hour of play and they got this money through begging. Therefore we feel like we are making a difference to these youngsters although we regret not being aware of Bright and his visions much earlier in our stay. We have informed GDM of his school and they are now very much in the future plans of the club, which is really exciting news to us.

Bright with his school kids at the church

We also have other highlights from our normal sessions you are aware of. Firstly we are eager to tell you about our wonder goals at our Academica’s session on a Tuesday. Will was on Brazil’s team (yellow bibs) and Meggo on Holland’s (orange bibs) at the end of the training. Firstly Will picked the ball up just after the half way line, beat about 6 players, nut-megged the 7^th and smashed a low drive into the bottom corner, just like Lionel Messi. Meggo then matched this effort with a simpler, but quite divine goal. The ball came into him along the floor from the left wing, he then chipped the ball up with one touch and volleyed from 25 yards out with the second past Shepard (the inspirational GDM U11’s keeper who somehow ended up at this session!?) into the top of the bamboo made goal. He wheeled away with supreme delight to the corner where his fellow Dutchman followed to do a very strange impression of a robot/Michael Jackson Billie Jean dance. Fantastic entertainment for the neutrals, which were a group of 4 years olds sitting at the side outside their house! We are also going through a phase of ending every session with a chorus of Batana Batana Waranay and running heedlessly around the pitch with every child following us. We blame Hard Life who started the whole charade!

Let's score some wonder goals!

Ok as always we have bleated on too much waffle for one edition, so we’ll end on our trip to Futeco Park. We went with Short and Joana in the back of the red love bug (good times!) and saw the impressive start to the moody Emirates of Manica. Although there is no grass yet the pitch has been flattened, seeds planted and when finished will be easily the best pitch in Mozambique. They plan to make a big stand for spectators and have 3 other pitches behind the main stadium. These for youth teams and community projects, but in our opinion most importantly for Gallos! Short gave us a tour of all the extensive gardening going on for future sustainable living. There were so many fruit trees being planted it was unbelievable and many gardeners popping out from the wilderness to greet us, before carrying on with their work. We also saw the yet to be completed changing rooms which were small but better than anything they have at the moment, as they currently get changed at the side of the road on the way to away games! We also saw Tasos’ house (head of irrigation and regular Gallos striker), which is next to the first team pitch. The project is moving slowly at the moment due to lack of funding, however when it is complete it will be a truly special football community for the whole of Manica. Football for Hope is hopefully going to help out with the funding for this mammoth project and will hopefully accelerate its progress. Pingi took soil samples to “Chimoioi to do document”, as he would say. No not really, to Johannesburg instead, to help increase the speed of building work in the near future. Anyway sorry to bore you once more, for this edition, from Trev and Trev thank you and good night!

The mandem at Futeco (Moody Emirates)!

“And Sherife’s getting over-excited!”

Yep that’s right we’re back and haven’t gone missing in action here in Mozambique! First things first, we apologise for taking so long to blog but it’s through no fault of our own. The rest of the world seems a very distant place as of 2 and half weeks ago when our internet connection was lost at sea. Well not sea but more due to financial crisis. Therefore we have found an internet café (more large room with 4 computers in it) on the main road and trudge up and down in hope of using the internet. The problem is that only 2 of these 4 computers have internet and the whole of Manica appears to use them, all of the time! The other issue is that the boss only opens from 9 until 12, closes for a 3 hour lunch (he has to cook his sadza which is quite a patient process we’ve been told) and then only opens until 4.30pm. Sadza remember is that maize type food which actually tastes of nothing! Therefore a challenge to say the least to actually get access to emails, social networking and most importantly blogging!

Arsene Scholes in action!

Now we may come across as if we’ve gone mad from our title of this post but our inspiration comes from some fantastic commentary work by Trev and Trev (they’re our commentary names for comedic and confidential effect). It all happened whilst filming the GDM first team match with Vumba, in which Flex scored an absolute wonder goal to level the tie to 1-1. We caught the action on film and as the El Hajj Diouf look alike ran to the bench to celebrate, we noticed the physio getting very carried away and dancing in front of the crowd. As soon as we saw this we both shouted in tandem, “and Sherife’s getting over excited, he can’t contain his sheer joy”! We must also let you know that Sherife is GDM’s biggest fan (as well as physio/ believer in hot water and salt to heal every injury going) and is a very happy, excitable chap to be around at the club. His trademark is his beaten up old bike from the 1970’s which has no gears, a broken seat and no brakes. We tried riding it but the pedals were so heavy we couldn’t get the thing to move. When he rides it however, he must hit about 100 mph using the soles of his feet to stop it! So we’re not crazy (just yet) but having a very fun time indeed.



Sherife's beast of a bike, modelled nicely by Will

Further to the 1-1 with Vumba in the league, the week before was also against the ‘moody spurs’ outfit in the Manica province cup final. It was always going to kick off between the wannabe Arsenal and Tottenham, with the fans at each others throats all week in the streets. The game started in quite a relaxed, pleasant fashion with Vumba taking the lead early in the first half. However mass mayhem broke out when just before half time the referee awarded GDM with a penalty for a blatant hand ball (although we were at the other end of the pitch, so no bias involved what so ever). The Vumba fans turned violent! In an act of protest they decided to throw rocks, gin bottles and whatever else was on them at the time (one guy even threw a baby) at the linesman and also started hurling abuse at us the GDM fans. It must be noted that most of the Vumba fans are alcoholic including Snoop drunk who we mentioned before and a guy who runs up and down continuously shouting “VUMBA LEOS, VUMBA LEOS”. He then does a very impressive Triple H impression by pouring a whole bottle of Vumba water over his head and falling over, before getting up and repeating the whole process again. The players at the club love Meggo’s impression of the Vumba Leos guy and constantly repeat it over and over again! Anyway from there the game went to extra time with the officials giving everything to Vumba and nothing to GDM in order to get home to their families alive that night. GDM had 2 stone wall penalties turned down before Vumba were awarded a very weak one in extra time, winning the game 2-1 and cheating their way to the cup. They now enter a national Mozambique cup which would’ve been a great opportunity for our boys, but not to be.

The mental Vumba fans rioting the pitch!

The final first team action was against bottom of the league Vanduzi. We went expecting an 8-0 drumming and 20 minutes in it looked possible as we went 2-0 up with goals from Mario (Lionel Messi) and Simozinho (moody Ronaldinho). However another refereeing howler (you can see a pattern repeating here can’t you?) gave the opposition a penalty for a header inside the box by Maninho (the Virgin who’s got a kid) which was thought by the ref to be a hand ball. The game struggled on and finished 2-1 to GDM but they were disrupted by poor managerial decisions by Miguel ‘Moriniho’, oh and the ref obviously didn’t help either!

Anyway after all the excitement of the first team’s action, we have also been busy working hard with the children and first team players themselves. We’ll start with the palaver that was ‘International Children’s Day’, although we’ve never heard of this day in England! It was a carnival like atmosphere with flags put up lining the streets, children off school and running riot everywhere, and music blaring out of every building (you would have thought that old Guebuza the president was visiting, oh wait that’s a story for a bit later). Considering it was probably the busiest day in the towns history, Pingi (Pingu, our head of youth operations at the club and usually makes sure we get to sessions ok) then decided he had to swan off to Chimoioi to do some sort of document in which he wouldn’t divulge into. This meant we had the challenge of using the ‘deathtrap’ that is the taxi-bus service to get to Anda orphanage alone. This is a very scary experience considering we are the only mzungo’s (white people) in Manica and don’t speak a word of Portuguese!

Academicas doing relays

However we made it alive and thought the hard work was over, how wrong we were. When we got there we were greeted by a man we nicknamed one leg Paul (because he’s only got 1 leg) and little snot-nose who we can’t determine if is a boy or girl due to clothing confusion. We were invited into their children’s day rave where music was pumped up to a ridiculously high level and a man on a microphone (MC waist coat, or to be honest waste man) offering lollipops to the best dancers. After this commotion one leg Paul (his real name Sandro) led us outside for some party drinks. We assumed this would be a Coke or fizzy Fanta, again how wrong we were! The vile concoction he brought us was cold, lumpy sadza liquid which tasted alcoholic. However the kids seemed to enjoy them, which is the most important thing. We took one sip before throwing up our breakfast (which ironically looked like someone had done before us into the cup)! We quickly gave our Sadza cocktails away!

MC Waistcoat's children's day bonanza!

We then were informed by Paul, sorry Sandro that we were refereeing two 90  minute games for the older girls and then boys of the orphanage against a local school. So what was planned to be an hour’s session soon turned into a day’s events, with Pingi in Chimoioi doing his document! It was great to see the orphans in-particular having such a fantastic day with the boys even winning their game (the girls got smashed though, with Meggo awarding the opposition a penalty to make the game more interesting, although it was 4-0 already at that point). In the past 2 weeks we have started playing mini-tournaments/matches at the orphanage separating the young ones and the older kids. One match of note was a 9-8 thriller with Will’s team victorious and Meggo’s losing out. Will scored a stunner which in-fact was meant to be a cross and ended up lobbing the keeper. As us coaches say, “You put the fruit in the mixer, and out comes a smoothie!” Again Pingdog wasn’t present, he claimed he was doing the same document in Chimoioi- again.

The thrilling orphanage game

We’ve been working vigorously with the under 17’s in the early morning sessions, and are finally starting to see some results. This is also true of the girls who have won 2 games out of 3 and we acclaim that to our excellent technique training. This is tremendous out here as previously they had never won a competitive match and now they are doing reasonably well in the league. The biggest highlight was our U17’s beating the moody spurs (you know who they are by now) 4-1, with a performance of sheer class and tenacity. The warm up master class we gave them for 30 minutes before the game was the real difference and meant we took a 3-0 lead inside 20 minutes. Apart from one glitch in defence, we were completely dominant and impressed the crowd of at least 15, in this early morning meeting. So us and Hardlife (David really) are working our magic and gaining from our great investment of effort.

Under 17's smashing the 'Moody Spurs' U17's

However our under 16’s are not quite firing on all cylinders as of yet. They have played 3 games in the league and are yet to win a game. They drew the first 2-2, coming back from 2-0 down. The next two games though were dismal performances, although they were up against better teams technically and physically. We will continue working hard with Chibanga (Chitty Chitty Chibanga- a first team player) to get better results before we return home.

Chitty Chitty Chibanga and mini- Chitty Chibanga

Our other, less competitive sessions with the younger kids are also going very well. We’ve introduced compulsory celebrations to winners of our various competitions which we overload the session with. For example new ones we didn’t mention last time are the David Villa bow, the Arshavin shoosh finger, the Peter Crouch robot which Meggo loves demonstrating and has forced it upon every child he has met, Gyan dancing, the Brazil World cup winning team of ’94 rocking the baby and finally the Robbie Keane cartwheel. We have also started making the mini-matches at the end of each session more fun, such as the coconut shy game where the players must knock a ball off a cone to score a goal, stopping the ball on the line and the conventional smashing the ball into a goal method. We’re also passing on the skills we learnt from the story telling course (thanks John) back in London, giving teams names and imaginative trophies to win. Normally this is a cone we pick up, give to them and they hold aloft victoriously. Sadly Arsenal never does too well in these competitions and by some strange coincidence it’s normally Man Utd vs Barcelona in the finals. Somehow Barcelona tends to win these!

Our little superstars in action at the Campo Municipal

We’ve also started getting used to the tiny areas of dirt which they call a football pitch and have many complications when walking across, let alone coaching on. One session we did actually have a car drive across us and Pingi informed us that this was a teacher leaving school. There’s also what we call ‘rivers’ on the pitches, actually just large dentures in the dirt which if you fall down, you disappear. The next problem arises when Hardlife and Pingi decide to let us communicate to the kids ourselves. This normally involves long demonstrations, hand gestures and long awkward silences. This then gets followed by chaos as they say they understand but then do the opposite. The other worrying thing is that the players translate what we say in English to the kids in Portuguese, but don’t speak English themselves. A splendid example of this is our friend ‘Cretin’ who Will asked if spoke English. He response was, “yes I speak perfect English.” This is about the only English we’ve managed to get out of him since, except when he sees us in the street and says “hello my friend” like every other person who sees us says. Thus the nick name Cretin was born. Plus he also looks like Plankton from Sponge Bob Square Pants!

Earthworm Jim and Will posing for the fans

The final highlight of our kid’s sessions is the African nation’s cup tournament we set up, with a final of Zimbabwe and Namibia. We played for an hour before it got dark and we assumed we’d stop the session and continue the next week. Again how wrong we were! Pingi was so enthusiastic as the linesman (on a 5 a-side pitch) that we played on into the dark and even did a penalty shootout in the final. After one penalty was taken it was so dark, we even lost the ball. Even this didn’t stop play and we continued until all 9 balls were lost. No really at least 3 were lost. Whilst we’re on the subject of missing balls (no not what you might think), we are now down to 7 footballs, which we share with 2 other coaches who have sessions at the same time. Quite difficult to plan sessions with about 4 balls for 30 + kids. It also doesn’t help when bibs (ok they are quite minging) are taken by mama out of our bag (Meggo’s hand luggage satchel) to be washed without us realising until we get to picking teams. However we have been promised the balls are on their way from Maputo, the capital. This was about 4 weeks ago though which is quite a concern seeing as that Maputo is 2 days journey away!

Hard Life in action at the smallest pitch in the worldddd (Jeremy Clarkson voice)

Away from our sessions, coaching course for the players and English lessons we mentioned last time and we are still continuing with, there are also some other random moments which have happened. Firstly and quite sadly our good friend Amade “Balotelli” has left the club. RIP. He has returned to his home after the manager and directors finally decided that he was of no use to the club, as all he did really was eat and sleep. However he claims he’ll be back next year for another crack at the big time, but hopefully his self proclaimed catch phrase of ‘1 chance, 1 goal’ will be a bit more accurate then! Moving on to more pressing issues, it has rained here for the first time and while we were coaching at that. We even had to pull out the old storm fit rain jackets (which aren’t water proof Arsenal) and it felt like we were both back at our schools in London. Apart from it still being very hot, it tipped it down, quite a nice sight! We’ve also pulled out secondary blankets for the evenings and mornings due to frost bite conditions. This also leads us onto a bit of a strange topic whereby we frequently speak to each other about random stuff while apparently asleep. Including Meggo asking Will who stole the toilet pipe and then claiming it was Maradona. Right before you jump to conclusions we haven’t gone crazy quite yet. Meggo was reading Maradona’s book before bed and that explains that. The toilet pipe is still a mystery however and it’s probably best it stays that way. The other interesting incident was when Meggo claimed he saw the security guard (the drunken one, not Chandle in the wind Chandulia) chasing a guy that was also being chased by a dog, away from stealing plates (yep sounds complicated but Meggo might have dreamt the whole thing anyway). The final incident involved a massive dog fight with at least 5 dogs, right outside our room. First mama’s friend dog Bobby then ‘apparently’ ran in and chased all the dogs away in different directions. Again quite weird we know!

Talking tic- tac tactics

Ok let’s not beat around the bush, it’s getting boring reading this and boring writing now so we’re going to finish on the greatest event Manica has ever seen. It was a fine Monday afternoon when President Armando Emilio Guebuza visited the town for a night. There was literally every single man, women, child and wild dog (even some Chinese people) lining the streets from 1pm in the afternoon awaiting the arrival of the great one. Although we didn’t see the great fuss when he arrived, he just looked like an old man with a flowery shirt. Anyway we waited 3 hours for him as in traditional Mozambique style he was fashionably late (fashionable being 3 hours minimum). So that was a historic occasion in our time here and one the people of Manica will never forget.

Finally we end on a more historic occasion. Meggo, after a 7 week stint, finally shaved the monstrosity that was his ginger goaty (well full on Father Christmas beard) off and Will shaved his hair, quite badly it must be said! It says a lot when you let another non-hairdresser person (Meggo) shave your hair. The trust level is phenomenal and didn’t pay off! Ok we’ll leave you on that bombshell, from Trev and Trev- Goodnight!

Costo Do Sol Kids loving Will