Rangdajied coach selected for honing his skills

SHILLONG, JULY 7: Forty-seven year old Santosh Kashyap, Randajied United FC’s chief coach, is among the fourteen  coaches from the country to be  selected to  take part in the first-ever Asian Football Confederation (AFC) professional diploma licence course to be held at the Cooperage Football Ground in Mumbai from July 24-28.

National coach Wim Koevermans, also a reputed UEFA pro-licence instructor in Europe, will be the course instructor. He will be assisted Bader Ahmed Shah, facilitator from AFC while AIFF technical director Robert Baan will also be present during the course.

Speaking about the course he has been selected to attend Kashyap said, “In my experience, coaching education is  very important as you get more confidence, knowledge and get to
learn new things to improve. It’s happening all over the world. So it’s very important in  today’s world for us  to be on par with the rest of the world.

Kashyap felt that had he attended pro-licence course earlier, maybe he could have been a better coach.  He informed whichever course he attended he learnt something new. He said, “I want to grasp more and more whenever I get to learn. Such courses will help me as a coach, for the team and the overall development of football.”

Kashyap expressed gratitude to the Rangdajied management who  he said had boosted his morale by encouraging him to go for the course. He said that coaching has always been about learning as he had learned from his inning at Mahindra United to Air India, from Air India to Mohun Bagan, then ONGC. So he said he wanted to do better and keep improving.

As per the AFC guidelines the AFC professional licence course will be conducted in four modules and the Western India Football Association (WIFA) will be official hosts for the first Module.

The second module will be an international assignment and is likely to be held next year in Japan where all the participants are required to travel as part of AFC guidelines.

The third module will consist of home-club attachment while the final module will comprise of assignments.- By Our Reporter