PROMINENT figure in the football fraternity, Desmond Lewis, believes that one way of improving the standard of football is to develop players from an early stage.
Lewis started his football career at Fairview Rovers in the 1960s.
He stated that under the Group Areas Act of the past apartheid government, followed by the forced removals, he and his family were forced to move from Fairview to Salsoneville.
He enrolled at Dower Teachers College in 1977 to do a physical education diploma. Lewis and other students formed Dower FC and won the Virginia Cup, beating Boast Pirates 4-1 in the final at Gelvan Stadium.
Lewis qualified as a physical education teacher in 1979. He returned to Rovers, where he started his football career. He was a player, captain, coach and eventually chairperson of the club.
In 1983, Rovers, under the reign of Lewis as a coach, he lifted the Mala Moodaley KO Cup.
Thereafter, he joined Park United FC for two years where he, as a player-coach, won the Northern Areas Soccer Board Premier League.
As time went on, he returned back to Rovers where he hung up his boots but he focused mainly on coaching.
Lewis guided the SAFA EP U/20 team that won the SAFA Vodacom National trophy in Pietermaritzburg, where he was voted as the best coach of the tournament.
He coached two local sides, Park United and Rainbow Stars, in the Vodacom League, which is now known as the ABC Motsepe League. Lewis also helped Park United to campaign in the National First Division.
In 1995, Lewis and the local coach, Boebie Williams, were nominated to attend with other coaches around the country at the first SAFA official coaching course after the unification that was conducted by the late Ted Dimitru in Johannesburg.
“After the course, Williams and I started three- to five-day coaching courses around the region.
“We were assisted by the PE Technikon College (now Nelson Mandela University) sports management lecturer, Vernon Oosthuizen, to share our newfound coaching information with the local coaches,” said Lewis.
“In 1998, I was called by SAFA to coach a selected Eastern Cape team that took on Bafana Bafana in Telkom Park Stadium (formerly known as the Boet Erasmus Stadium).”
Lewis has attended many coaching courses and he has conducted many coaching workshops around the province.
“I believe that we need to develop our players at an early age to prepare them for the football of highest standard,” he concluded.
