Maradona in Dubai! This was probably published in almost every newspaper in the world. No, He is not on tour, yes he landed a job as head coach for Al Wasl football team.
Al Wasl has always been setting the standards for most of the teams in the country. Winning so many titles and producing UAE’s brightest stars at least in the 80’s and 90’s lead to Al Wasl being selected as the club of the century in the UAE. Undoubtedly, Al Wasl also has the largest and most loyal fan base in the country. This year, of course, Al Wasl did what most clubs in the world did not think of, hiring the legendary Diego Armando Maradona, Arguably the best player football has produced as their head coach. The news was mostly received with optimism and some doubted his ability as a coach. Fortunately for Al Wasl, the team had an excellent start to the season. After that, Al Wasl went into a loosing streak, with one or two games of poor performance from the team, while other results can be attributed to poor refereeing.
And of course, with the typical reaction our media has to wins and losses they started asking the question of should Al Wasl fire Maradona. Some even went further and suggested that Al Wasl has already fired Maradona. As many of you know, our media in general and sports media in particular is not very professional. One day you are king and the next day you are a looser. Let us not forget how the media hailed the signing of Ex-National team head coach Srecko Katanec and said he had an excellent coaching CV. What CV were they talking about as Katanec has only coached his country’s national team only! The argument I am trying to make at least about Maradona’s case is very simple. Someone in the media wants to be popular so why not chase a popular person and try to take him down and claim the honor for that. My questions to those who are trying to claim fame at the expense of Al Wasl, what would have been your view if the refereeing decisions in a few games went Al Awasl’s way and the team would have had more points. I guess, they would hail Maradona as KING!
I think that Al Wasl should stick to Maradona, and support him this season and the next season. Since his arrival, he has created an excellent ambience and what is most important is that the players love him. Maradona has also brought to the club a lot of publicity, which has been amazing. In my opinion, he is also one of the few coaches to bench the International stars for their poor performance, and play young Emarati players in their place. In many other teams, this meant the coach would be sacked the next day. We have seen how our best talents in other teams are spending most of their time on the bench. Saeed Al katheeri of Al Wahada and Ahmed Ali of Bani Yas are a good example. On the contrary, we saw Rashid Essa and Khaleefa Abdulla getting their chances. While Maradona is not the best coach in the world, I think his passion for the game is what drives the team. And even if we get the best professional coach in the world, the team would probably not do any better. We are in a league that is called professional, but we all know for a fact that in its reality, our football league is still in amateur and will probably stay so for quite a while.
I think what the management of Al Wasl Football Company has been doing lately has been very good for the team. I want to touch on a very important aspect that they have started re-investing in the youth system, which is probably the most important pillar of the club. You may remember that back in the 90’s Al Wasl had one of the best youth systems, and in fact, I can only remember one winner for the youth league. I remember long ago when there were even programs broadcasted on national television of football training from Al Wasl Football Academy. This is diffinitely where the focus should be, as they will create the backbone for the team. For a lot of these youngsters, having a legend like Maradona around them will definitely boost their moral and will make them work hard to become legends like him.
So in my opinion keeping Maradona for his full length of his contract would be the wisest decision. Let us not go for the short-term wins but look at the big picture and go for the long-term wins. Al Wasl management should not listen to our media, which does not seem to know what they are talking about most of the time, those post match TV programs will tell you enough about their quality. I assure you that you will have the backing of your fans. And yes, we need some new high quality signings, specially in defense. It has been a while since the double in 2007. Let us try to get the best out of this season and be prepared to win silverware next season.