How Leopards coach Kimani is monitoring players fitness

The Kenyan Premier League season has been disrupted by coronavirus pandemic, but AFC Leopards coach Anthony Kimani is keenly monitoring the physical fitness of his players via online.

Kimani, who is exactly a year old at the club as coach, has constantly kept in touch with his players as they individually conduct physical fitness in the confinement of their houses and in respective playing fields near their homes as they await the resumption of the league.

Although it is not mandatory, players are expected to send short video clips of their training sessions every fortnight to the club WhatsApp group. Kimani and physical fitness coach Vincent Mbwavi then analyse the clips and advise the players accordingly.

“I normally call any of the players randomly and inquire from them whether they have been following religiously the training programme sent to them by fitness coach,” Kimani said.

He added: “The players could also send video clips although this is not mandatory as these are hard times and players may not have money to buy data bundles and I left this as an open option. Players who are able to record videos while training are free to post them in the team WhatsApp group.”

Kimani, who joined Ingwe last year in February, said that talking to individual players one-on–one he is able tell whether they have been following the programme. Players also open up on the challenges they encounter while at home.

He said videos links from players have given him insights on how the players are coping with home training. His main concern is the workload the players are doing at home even as they try to keep fit.

“My worry is that since there is no physical monitoring the players can do excess training and this could be counterproductive because the video clip they post are seconds long and are not enough for me to gauge their training time,” said Kimani.

Kimani revealed that the coronavirus pandemic has hit his training plans below the belt just at a time when the City cats were having a good run in the league.

“We were consistent and we had gathered enough momentum to challenge the top three finish and a lot of players who were in the injury list were picking up well and I am sure by now they would have hit their peak performance,” said Kimani.

Some of the players who were slowly coming out of the injury before the league was stopped include Saad Musa and Marvin Nabwire who are both attacking midfielders, Vincent Oburu (winger) and Collins Shichenje who is a central defender cum attacking midfielder.

Another challenge Kimani faces is that some of these players may gain wait as they are spending a great deal of their time in the house.

“Their eating habits are going to be disrupted and that translates to weight gain and weight is one thing I don’t want to deal with particularly for a player who is recovering from injury,” added coach Kimani.

But not all is gloom during the league break caused by coronavirus pandemic.

“The players had a long season as the KPL was trying to conform with the Fifa calendar and didn’t have enough time to rest and this is another moment to take that deserved break,” added coach Kimani, who is a former AFC Leopards and Mathare United utility player.

Kimani said the break is a good moment for players and technical bench to reflect on what went wrong in the last part of the season. As head of the technical bench, he is walking the talk and runs three times a week and conducts self-workout in the house to remain fit.

“I also ensure I am in top condition as I do physical training and watch my diet and post online to players what I do because that would inspire them to maintain their training regime,” said the father of two girls aged 13 and two years. The abrupt break has also given him time to bond with his family.

“I feel nice spending quality time with my family. There is moment I am out for two weeks and almost every weekend honouring congested fixtures. It feels nice when my little daughter step on my big toes and scratches my palms in the living room while my elder daughter reminds me to remember her young sister birthday promise gift in the next two months,” said coach Kimani.

Fitness coach Mbwavi who is the brains behind the training programme said he knows the ability of all players and designs the training according to their strength.

“Football is about physical fitness and every day I design a programme that deals with full body and depending on players needs in a bid to improve and maintain their endurance levels while they are at home,” said Mbwavi.

Mbwavi said diet is key factor in training and advises his players to check their carbohydrate intake to avoid bulging.