{"id":72006,"date":"2018-11-23T11:40:55","date_gmt":"2018-11-23T09:40:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.times.mw\/?p=72006"},"modified":"2018-11-23T12:03:46","modified_gmt":"2018-11-23T10:03:46","slug":"eswatini-giants-to-hire-kinnah-phiri","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/2018\/11\/23\/eswatini-giants-to-hire-kinnah-phiri\/","title":{"rendered":"eSwatini giants to hire Kinnah Phiri"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>By Peter Kanjere:<\/p>\n<p>Malawi football legend Kinnah Phiri is reportedly on his way to eSwatini, formerly Swaziland, where that country\u2019s Premier League giants Mbabane Swallows have offered him a short-term contract.<\/p>\n<p>Kinnah, whose last coaching job was at <a href=\"https:\/\/www.times.mw\/kinnah-phiri-seals-2-year-deal\/\">Mochudi Chiefs<\/a> in Botswana, was not readily available for comment yesterday, but Swallows General Manager, Sandile Zwane, did.<\/p>\n<blockquote><p><em>\u201cYes, we are hiring him on short-term [basis]. Actually, [we are hiring him] for Africa tournament as our coach is suspended,\u201d<\/em> Zwane said in a texted response to <em>The Daily Times<\/em>.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>National Football Coaches Association General Secretary, Dave Mpima, Thursday said he was not aware of Kinnah\u2019s offer in eSwatini. Malawian Charles Manda also coaches in eSwatini.<\/p>\n<p>eSwatini leading newspaper, <em>Times of Swaziland<\/em>, has also confirmed Swallows\u2019 offer to Kinnah.<\/p>\n<p>Swallows were drawn against Simba of Tanzania in the 2019 Confederation of African Football (Caf) Champions League but Caf suspended their coach Thabo Vilakati two months ago after reportedly attacking a ball-boy during a Champions League game against Clube Desportivo of Angola.<\/p>\n<p>That Swallows opted for the Malawi\u2019s all-time leading scorer (with 67 goals) is unsurprising. In his twilight, Kinnah played for, before coaching, another eSwatini side Manzini Wanderers in 1982.<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>Zwane alluded to these facts:<em> \u201cHe is familiar with our football. He has a lot of respect among [sic] our players and supporters. He has a lot of experience in football.\u201d<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Kinnah sneaked out to eSwatini in frustration after then Malawi football authorities refused to clear him to sign a big money move to a Saudi Arabian team.<\/p>\n<p>Eventually, Kinnah coached Manzini, paving the way for his appointment as deputy eSwatini coach. Kinnah returned home to coach Bullets in 2001. He made his name at the People\u2019s Team as a prolific scorer.<\/p>\n<p>Kinnah also coached <a href=\"https:\/\/www.times.mw\/kinnah-phiri-sacked-demands-k40-million\/\">Mbeya City FC<\/a> in Tanzania, months after parting ways with Free State Stars of South Africa\u2019s Premier Soccer League, a team that also holds him in high esteem having had three stints with them.<\/p>\n<p>Kinnah hit the headlines a few weeks ago when he issued a press release disputing reports that he had joined opposition UTM.<\/p>\n<p>He attended the political party\u2019s rally in Mzuzu and announced that he was joining them, only for him to make a U-turn, saying he was a member of the Democratic Progressive Party.<\/p>\n<p>Kinnah also told the press that the government had earmarked him for a post of football director.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By Peter Kanjere: Malawi football legend Kinnah Phiri is reportedly on his way to eSwatini, formerly Swaziland, where that country\u2019s Premier League giants Mbabane Swallows have offered him a short-term contract. Kinnah, whose last coaching job was at Mochudi Chiefs in Botswana, was not readily available for comment yesterday, but Swallows General Manager, Sandile Zwane, [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":15021,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-72006","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\/72006","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=72006"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72006\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":72012,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72006\/revisions\/72012"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/15021"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=72006"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=72006"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=72006"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}