Mahlatse Makudubela has backed former Marumo Gallants and AmaZulu head coach Romain Folz and suggested he was perhaps sabotaged in his recent roles.
Folz confirmed his resignation from AmaZulu at the end of the season, as he was seeking to get back into coaching, with Sandile Zungu having moved him into a Technical Director role at the club, where internally, things were going sour withing the squad.
A run of poor results, nearly fighting relegation at some point, and the last three coaches all complaining about alleged player power within the squad has seen Zungu make dramatic changes, with several management exits and 11 players released.
Amidst the changes, Abbubaker Mobara stated that Folz was a manipulative coach and made them ‘believe in something that wasn’t there’ – which comes from a player that Folz wanted to remove from the squad, as well as former coach Brandon Truter before his exit.
“I worked closely with him, I can tell you how he is as a person, how he work, how he functions,” Makudubela tells iDiski Times.
“I’ve never worked with a coach that honest, he always keeps players on their toes, when you’re in a team and you’re not playing, usually, you start to develop that thing to say, the coach doesn’t like me, but it wasn’t like that with Romain.
“Ask anyone, call anyone who worked with him, Ranga wasn’t playing that much under Romain when he got there, but ask him, how Romain is? Very good coach, all the players who worked with him at Marumo would tell you how good he is. An honest coach, open and kept the players happy.
“But if you are ill-disciplined, he is straight like that, if you are not disciplined you will fall out because he wants disciplined players, honest players, who are willing to work with him and fight for the team if you know what I’m saying.
“So he’s a coach of high integrity, I recently went to Amsterdam and got back last week, I had the privilege of sitting opening with Raymond Verheijen, the Dutchman, listening to his philosophy, his way of thinking of the game, it was like I was listening to coach Romain.
“I even sent him a text to say this and I learnt a lot under him. As a player, I grew and learned a lot [in that month].”
While Makudubela backed his character, the longing question over why he couldn’t secure a win at Gallants before his resignation still lingers, which the former Orlando Pirates winger believes was purely down to a lack of lack and potential interference in his job.
“Under Romain at Marumo, he lost one game against Orlando Pirates, the rest were draws, which was just a matter of luck, we weren’t converting chances to win the games, but he had a good record,” he said.
“Things didn’t work out for many dubious reasons of course, you know, you read the story that management was trying to interfere and he wanted other things, you know, and that says a lot of his character, he believes in what he believes and he’s honest like that.
“Ask Ndlonldo, anyone, actually… that worked with coach, but obviously with other players they would be scared to talk for many other reasons, fear of favour and prejudice, but I can openly say the coach is a very straight forward and honest, good and of high integrity.”
Folz has now returned to his native France where he is set to weigh up his options before returning to management again.
