By Mabinty M. Kamara
The Director of Participation and Sustainable Sports at the National Sports Authority (NSA) has been dropped from Sierra Leone’s delegation to Nigeria and the Republic of Guinea for the start of the country’s AfCON 2023 campaign against Nigeria and Guinea Bissau respectively.
Steven Keifala stands accused of publishing a “classified report” on three friendly matches played by the national football team in Turkey in March this year on social media. He was ordered to “respectfully refund the allowance you have already received in lieu of the said travels”. Politico understands that the allowance in question runs into about four thousand US dollars.
In a letter signed by the Executive Director of NSA, Dr. Kenneth Brima, and seen by Politico it is stated that the eleventh-hour decision to drop Keifala was arrived at because “the head coach of Leone Stars, John Keister in a meeting with the Minister of Sports and the NSA disclosed that the publication has not just caused psychological damage on him and his technical team but has impacted the players negatively going into the two crucial matches in both Nigeria and Guinea respectively”.
It adds that “the head coach advised that he would be uncomfortable with your inclusion in the delegation as that would negatively affect the morale of the technical team and players”.
In the report itself, Keifala noted that the technical team of Leone Stars fail to introduce “tactical play to gain goals during matches, weak game plan among players on the pitch when it comes to the team having free kicks against their opponents, it appears no plan as to how that kick should be taken, nor tactics when attacking their opponent to get a goal, and little coordination among the players, and more importantly the team formation system are all very weak”.
The director says “that little or no assessment is done on foreign-based players in terms of physical fitness at the time of invitation to participate in matches for the Leones Stars. Most often, after the first training session, the technical team will realize some players are not physically fit to play”. He also described the nighttime movement of players while in camp as “uncontrolled”.
Keifala said his findings “clearly show that the technical team needs to step up their approach to ensuring the team formation and game plan is very clear to the players so they know who does what and how it should be done during matches”.
Leone Stars are due to play Nigeria on the 9th of June and Guinea Bissau in Abuja and Conakry respectively a week later.
Copyright © 2022 Politico Online (06/06/22)
