Golden Drifters receives training from Coaches Across Continents

Coaches and players from Golden Drifters Academy were able to benefit from the expertise offered by Coaches Across Continents (CAC) during a workshop that ran at The Hope Centre from 11 to 15 February.

CAC’s visit to Zandspruit was organised by the founder of Football Without Borders, Michael Mapfunde, and made possible by generous funding from the Canadian High Commission to South Africa. The aim of the five-day workshop was to provide both soccer and netball players and coaches with ways for them to incorporate addressing social issues such as bullying and drug abuse into their training programmes.

Markus Bensch of CAC was accompanied by his colleague and CAC Community Impact Coach, Vincent Mudzanani, to carry out the training over the course of the five days. The weather didn’t always play along for the coaches and players, but even when the rain came pouring down they didn’t let this stop them from training and continued indoors.

The workshop formed part of a commitment made by Michael and FWB to CAC’s three-year Hat-Trick Partnership Programme, which includes on-field sport for social impact coaching. According to Markus, the workshop week was highly successful, and they look forward to what could happen for the participants in the future. “As the week went on, people began to engage more and more, and by the time the end came, they seemed to have learnt a lot from us,” he said.

There was also a handover of brand new kit, boots, and balls to players and coaches that will help immensely with their training programmes.