A five-day Member Association Elite Referees Course organised by the Football Association of Malawi (FAM) has started on Tuesday afternoon at the Mpira Village in Blantyre
About 30 elite referees across the country are taking part in the course
FAM executive committee member and Chairperson for Referees subcommittee Rashid Ntelera, who officially opened the course ,said it is important to conduct such programmes to help the referees to move with time and be updated as laws of the game keep on evolving.
“It’s an annual course organized by FIFA through the MAs to equip referees with the new modern ways of officiating. Of course the coincidences cannot be overlooked where we have had some issues and it’s the right time to remind the referees of their obligations to adhere to the rules and the consequences that comes when they don’t adhere to these rules so it’s an eye opener for these elites referees to learn and improve their work,” he said.
In his remarks, South African FIFA Referees Instructor Carlos Henriques who is the course’s lead facilitator, has advised the referees to be strong in their line of duty.
“The referees have to work hard and be mentally fit. They can’t just wait for these courses but they also need to be vigilant in the line of duty. They work on weekly basis and I personally have been monitoring them, so they need to work hard because the more they do that, the better they become,” he said.
On her part, one of the participating referees Rose Zimba says the course will help them to be conversant with the new laws of the game.
“It will help us to cope up with the new laws of the game. Our friends elsewhere are more advanced than us so this is the opportunity for us to learn and improve our game so that we help to develop the game,” she concluded.
Henriques is facilitating the course together with a Malawian FIFA Referees Technical Instructor Mark Mzengo, with assistance from other local instructors including Martha Nyekanyeka, Michael Makoto, Moffat Champiti and Boswell Msango.
