{"id":69724,"date":"2018-09-27T07:58:06","date_gmt":"2018-09-27T05:58:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.times.mw\/?p=69724"},"modified":"2018-09-27T07:58:07","modified_gmt":"2018-09-27T05:58:07","slug":"tn-stars-german-mentor-arrives","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/2018\/09\/27\/tn-stars-german-mentor-arrives\/","title":{"rendered":"TN Stars German mentor arrives"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>By Mabvuto Kambuwe:<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_69727\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-69727\" style=\"width: 251px\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.times.mw\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/09\/szopinski.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-69727\" src=\"http:\/\/www.times.mw\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/09\/szopinski-251x300.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"251\" height=\"300\" srcset=\"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/09\/szopinski-251x300.jpg 251w, https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/09\/szopinski.jpg 305w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 251px) 100vw, 251px\" \/><\/a><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-69727\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">EXPATRIATE\u2014 Szopinski<br \/>captured on arrival at Kamuzu International Airport<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>TN Stars consultant Technical Advisor, Rainer Szopinski, has said African football teams have the potential to do well but lack defending skills.<\/p>\n<p>Szopinski, who claimed to have trained former Germany national football team coach J\u00fcrgen Klinsmann, disclosed this in an interview upon arrival in Lilongwe on Tuesday.<\/p>\n<blockquote><p><em>\u201cI think African teams do not have good defenders because they like going forward so this exposes them at the back and they end up losing a match. African teams were good at the World Cup finals [in Russia] but they are not at the same level with European teams,\u201d<\/em> he said.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Szopinski\u2019s three-week stint is a boost to Stars ahead of their TNM Super League clash against Nchalo United at Kasungu Stadium on Sunday.<\/p>\n<p>He was expected to have his first training session with Stars players Wednesday in Kasungu.<\/p>\n<p>Szopinski said he would not rush to make a judgement on Stars\u2019 football philosophy before appreciating the players\u2019 weakness and strengths.<\/p>\n<p>While in the country, the German will drill Stars players and coaches.<\/p>\n<p>The German claimed that his football philosophy is similar to that of Premier League leaders Liverpool\u2019s Manager J\u00fcrgen Klopp and his France\u2019s PSG counterpart Thomas Tuchel.<\/p>\n<p>The German, who has coached teams in Rwanda, Togo, Italy, Greece and Morocco, advised Malawian coaches to emulate the two German coaches\u2019 style of play. Szopinski likes 4-4-2 playing system.<\/p>\n<p>With eight games to go, Stars, the first Kasungu District football team to earn Super League promotion, are on position nine with 28 points from 22 games on the league\u2019s log table.<\/p>\n<p>Stars Coach, Meke Mwase, on Tuesday said he was looking forward to benefitting from the German\u2019s expertise. There is no other expatriate coach in the Super League.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By Mabvuto Kambuwe: TN Stars consultant Technical Advisor, Rainer Szopinski, has said African football teams have the potential to do well but lack defending skills. Szopinski, who claimed to have trained former Germany national football team coach J\u00fcrgen Klinsmann, disclosed this in an interview upon arrival in Lilongwe on Tuesday. \u201cI think African teams do [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":58732,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-69724","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/69724","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=69724"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/69724\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":69728,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/69724\/revisions\/69728"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/58732"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=69724"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=69724"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=69724"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}