Mamelodi Sundowns head coach Miguel Cardoso says Jayden Adams, like many talented South African players has potential to succeed abroad but there needs to be the correct pathways.
Adams, 24, emerged as one of the finest midfielders in the country after bursting onto the scene with Stellenbosch as a teenager as they won promotion to the top-flight and eventually broke into the senior national team after being capped at U20 and U23 level.
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Sundowns naturally came calling for the box to box midfielder where he’s now shown that he’s equally adept in playing as a playmaking six and various other midfield roles required for Sundowns system.
Amidst his incredible run of form of late for club and country, iDiski Times posed the question to Cardoso where is Adams’ level as compared to the players he worked with in LaLiga and Ligue 1 during his coaching career – with the view of where his potential can take him.
“That is a fantastic question to understand the level of Soutb African players [compared to abroad], when you see Foster in the national team, plays in England in a league that is so tough and good quality in the teams, coaching staff, the facilities and he comes to the national team and then you see our players,” Cardoso said.
“Drespite them playing different positions, the other players show the level to be up there – but the challenge on our minds and I understand your questions, is who else could be there? Or where could these guy be. For this you need to raise this stimulus, probably on the age, where it’s not too late.
“And then with that stimulus, of training and competition they also grow for that level – that’s how I see the things. South Africa has talents – everybody knows. The importance is obviously how to bring the talents abroad.
“We also know the basis of the football structure is not exactly like Europe, the clubs look for players very young, because they thinking of the business of reselling them, even the biggest teams, so youth is quite important.”
The Sundowns coach went on to state that talents need to be developed at an earlier age to be ready for the Premier Soccer League (PSL) and then potentially abroad, while the networks of agents and clubs became imperative too.
“In South Africa we know the talents appear a little but later than usual in Europe, so some players get out of target for the biggest teams and another thing that needs to be opened is corridors of business, association with the biggest agents abroad, because South Africa has players that can go abroad, no doubt, there’s players that can be exported,” he said.
“To what level? I don’t know but what I know is, many Brazilian players for example, go to Portugal and don’t always enter the biggest teams, they go for a second [tier] of team and then they have one or two years of experience, show the level and then do the job for the biggest [clubs].
“Speaking about Jayden, you can mention other names that obviously, with their age could challenge for those kind of steps, it’s not up for me to speak but I think there’s quality and talent in South Africa, it’s just a matter of finding the right way to take them there.”
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