Your work at AFC cut out for you, Mr Marin

What you need to know:

  • Following the resignation of John Stewart Hall, we quickly settled on Dorin Marin as his replacement.
  • Our new man in fact arrived in Nairobi at the weekend to take over the reigns at the Ingwe Den and we wish him every success in his new duties.
  • The 56-year-old Romanian has agreed to start work immediately with the possibility of joining the squad in Tanzania for the inaugural SportPesa Super Cup tournament scheduled to kick off Monday.

Following the resignation of John Stewart Hall, we quickly settled on Dorin Marin as his replacement.

Our new man in fact arrived in Nairobi at the weekend to take over the reigns at the Ingwe Den and we wish him every success in his new duties.

The 56-year-old Romanian has agreed to start work immediately with the possibility of joining the squad in Tanzania for the inaugural SportPesa Super Cup tournament scheduled to kick off Monday.

Hall resigned citing relocation of his family from the UK to Canada leaving Ingwe lying 12th on the league table with four wins, three draws and six loses after 13 matches.

Marion boasts of a wealth of experience having managed a number of clubs in Lebanon, Syria, Omani, Uganda, Ghana and his homeland Romania.

The new coach finds an Ingwe in a stale situation having gone winless in seven straight league matches - against Sofapaka, Rangers, Gor Mahia, Sony Sugar, Zoo Kericho, Homeboyz and Tusker.

He will be taking over a team comprising young players signed from different clubs ahead of the 2017 season.

Many people expected Ingwe to be challenging for top honours after they started the league on a high note, only for that promising, nay scary momentum, to peter badly leaving the boys struggling to just stay afloat

The Romanian thus has a huge task of turning around the team’s fortunes.

I know he was close to taking over at Ingwe in the early 2015 following Pieter Hendrick De Jongh’s departure but was beaten to the job by Zdravko Logarusic.

So, he is very much aware of this great club of ours whose league record is only second to our noisy neighbours. But not for long.

I’m convinced that Marin is the right man for the job and we are confident he can take us back to the top.

Every player, every technical bench member, every team officials and every fan must work hard for the team.

We need to stay together and keep our focus on how best we can finish the season high up on the table, or even winning this thing.

In case it has not been brought to the attention of the European, the last time we really had world beating team was during about three years ago. In the team, under Jan Koops, was Patrick Matasi, Edwin Wafula, Abdalla Juma, Martin Imbalambala, Jonas Nahimana, Erick Masika, Salim Kinje, Bernard Mang’oli, Mike Barasa, Mike Khamati, Austine Ekenna, Barnabas Tiema, Oscar Kadenge, Edwin Seda among others.

There were performance bonuses paid weekly to players as a form of incentive.

Winning bonuses that were there from the times of chairman Alfred Sambu in the 1980s must always be dangled at the players to keep them motivated.

Meanwhile, the habit of changing players every year will not help Ingwe.

There must really be consistency as we build a strong and might team that will send shivers of terror down the spine of any opponent we face.

To achieve this, we clearly need more experienced players to be able to compete with the likes of K’Ogalo, Tusker and Ulinzi .

But we should also retain most of these upcoming fresh talent we have. Obviously they will only get better as they gain more experience.

Once more I take this opportunity to congratulate coach Marin on his new job as the head coach of AFC Leopards.

Leopards will be looking forward to a new beginning and will be depending on you!

We are a big club in Kenya and Africa. I dare say, you cannot talk about Kenyan football without mentioning Leopards.