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Golden Arrows coach Manqoba Mngqithi has urged KZN clubs to intensify their focus on grassroots development, insisting it remains the most sustainable path for their long-term survival.
With their Gauteng rivals flexing their financial muscle in the transfer market – often weakening teams like Arrows in the process – Mngqithi believes investing in youth development is both logical and necessary.
He says the most effective way for Abafana Bes’thende to remain competitive is by building a strong pipeline that can continually feed into the first team while safeguarding the club’s identity and future.
"That is the reality of football, throughout the world, they are selling teams and they are buying teams and the selling teams must make sure that their pipelines are stronger to make sure that they always have the next breed,” Mngqithi said.
“So, that we securitate the market and those who buy will keep buying and buying and our teams will get richer and we'll be able to buy one or two good players here and there and stabilise our teams and make sure that we can start competing.
“But we cannot stop thinking that we should develop players in order to sell so that we balance our books and we are able to reinvest a little bit and see what we can get but the directions that the teams are taking, believe me, it's very good because not all these players can be bought.
“If all these players are bought then it means our teams will be better off financially and that is what we should be driving towards."
According to Mngqithi’s observation, KZN teams are also no longer a dumping site for players in the twilight of their careers.
"And we've gone younger man in all these teams and I like that because it's some form of liberation from our side because we've always been those teams that when you don’t want something, you dump it in KZN,” the coach added.
“Then we asked ourselves why we are always struggling when we've got so much talent in the province. The reality is that we were struggling because we were using the players that are in most cases rejected by other teams and maybe at that time they are no longer at the level that they can help us. Maybe they are already on the side, so it's encouraging for me."
