{"id":10218,"date":"2022-02-06T18:24:54","date_gmt":"2022-02-06T18:24:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/gambia\/uncategorized\/afcon-2021-how-gambia-head-coach-tom-saintfiet-transformed-the-scorpions"},"modified":"2022-02-06T19:12:57","modified_gmt":"2022-02-06T19:12:57","slug":"afcon-2021-how-gambia-head-coach-tom-saintfiet-transformed-the-scorpions","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/gambia\/all-news\/afcon-2021-how-gambia-head-coach-tom-saintfiet-transformed-the-scorpions","title":{"rendered":"AFCON 2021: HOW GAMBIA HEAD COACH TOM SAINTFIET TRANSFORMED THE SCORPIONS"},"content":{"rendered":"

Africa-Press – Gambia. <\/strong><\/span>Tom Saintfiet and his players are under attack, with only a cluster of soldiers standing between them and a group of angry fans. Surrounded by seething supporters all around the stadium, there\u2019s little more the Gambia boss can do but take cover from the objects being hurled his way.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s 2018 and the Scorpions have just lost 1-0 to Togo, the first defeat of Saintfiet\u2019s short reign as head coach of the West African nation.<\/p>\n

After a pair of draws in his opening two matches in charge, the Belgian could have been forgiven for thinking he\u2019d made a solid start considering Gambia hadn\u2019t won a competitive match for five years prior to his appointment. But as he\u2019s marched off the pitch under armed guard, it\u2019s clear he has a lot more to do to earn the fans\u2019 appreciation.<\/p>\n

Embed from Getty Images<\/p>\n

\u201cIn my third match, we lost 1-0 at home to Togo and that\u2019s when we saw the passion of the Gambia fans,\u201d recalls the well-travelled coach.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe couldn\u2019t leave the pitch and the army had to come with shields because the fans were throwing bottles and stones at us. We\u2019d lost 1-0 to Togo, who were 50 positions better off than us in the world rankings at the time and Gambia hadn\u2019t won for five years, but we still had stones and bottles thrown as us.\u201d<\/p>\n

Fast forward four years and not only has Saintfiet managed to turn around the swell of negative emotion he faced after that Togo defeat to remain in charge, but if he stood in the midst of Gambian fans today, he\u2019d be mobbed as a national hero instead.<\/p>\n

The turnaround has been stark. After finally breaking Gambia\u2019s long wait for a win with victory over Benin a month after losing to Togo, Saintfiet\u2019s side upset the odds to qualify for this year\u2019s African Cup of Nations \u2013 the country\u2019s first ever major tournament \u2013 as the lowest-ranked nation to ever play in the competition.<\/p>\n

Gambia weren\u2019t there to merely make up the numbers, though. Ranked 151st in FIFA\u2019s rankings before the tournament kicked off, the Scorpions drew with Mali and beat Tunisia on the way to topping their group, before getting past Guinea in the last-16 to set up a quarter-final tie with hosts Cameroon. A 2-0 defeat in Douala would see the fairy tale end there, but it marked a monumental achievement.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe reason I stepped in [in 2018] was because I really believed there was more quality in Gambian football than people thought,\u201d Saintfiet explains.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn the first few weeks I was here, I said to the president and vice president, \u2018we will qualify for the African Cup\u2019 and they said \u2018calm down, calm down, it\u2019s just the first match we haven\u2019t lost in years\u2019. We laugh about it now, but it\u2019s true.\u201d<\/p>\n

Saintfiet\u2019s confidence came from a deep understanding of what it takes to manage a smaller nation, with Gambia the 48-year-old\u2019s 12th international coaching job \u2013 10 as head coach of a senior side \u2013 in a career that has seen him work in four continents. He\u2019s taken jobs in several lesser-vaunted nations, including Yemen, Namibia and Ethiopia, and faced an array of challenges along the way.<\/p>\n

One of the most extreme was after taking the Zimbabwe national team job in 2010 when he was tipped off during a training session that the state police were coming to arrest him due to a discrepancy with his visa. Unable to go back to his hotel, Saintfiet holed up nearby for a few hours before crossing the border under the cover of darkness into neighbouring Botswana to evade capture.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s made for an eclectic CV and one that sometimes draws ridicule for the amount of job hopping he\u2019s done in the past two decades. To fully understand Saintfiet\u2019s numbers, it\u2019s important to listen to the context, he reasons.<\/p>\n

Embed from Getty Images<\/p>\n

\u201cSometimes you don\u2019t have the choice and it\u2019s me who always accepted the jobs, so I don\u2019t have to blame other people for it,\u201d he says. \u201cIn Namibia, I took over two games from the end [of a qualification campaign] and immediately got good results and then it took a while before the next qualifiers started.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd in other countries, I signed a three-month deal in Malawi, in Ethiopia it was for five months, in Bangladesh it was three. These countries say they don\u2019t have budget for a foreign coach or even a coach if they don\u2019t have matches for five or six months after qualifying ends.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere are things I accept, but sometimes I\u2019m not happy because people judge my CV and say \u2018this guy never stays anywhere very long\u2019 but they don\u2019t know the ins and outs of it.<\/p>\n

\u201cLike I said, in Malawi, 10 months after I left they still hadn\u2019t appointed a new coach because there were no games coming up. That was agreed before I signed a three-month deal, so I did my job and did my three months. On the other hand, it\u2019s also good that I have the experience of working in all these countries because it makes me a stronger coach right now.\u201d<\/p>\n

There\u2019s an argument that Gambia are now reaping the rewards for that. Upon taking the job in 2018 \u2013 this time on a longer-term deal \u2013 Saintfiet started laying foundations.<\/p>\n

A new team manager was hired as part of a plan to instil greater organisation off the pitch, with Saintfiet insisting the squad stayed in better quality hotels, booked on \u201cbetter\u201d flights and had tighter processes to make playing for Gambia a slicker and more enjoyable experience.<\/p>\n

With that side of things in check, the Belgian coach began to overhaul the on-pitch philosophy, transitioning the side from the attractive tiki-taka style that had been easy on the eye, but ultimately led to the Scorpions losing far more often that not.<\/p>\n

Under Saintfiet, Gambia would be more tactically disciplined and harder to beat. Once a more defined structure began to take shape, the next step was to identify new players to join the revolution.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn the past three-and-a-half years, I\u2019ve let 34 players make their debuts for Gambia \u2013 not all of them made it, but that\u2019s quite a lot,\u201d Saintfiet tells The Set Pieces.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn my first year, I lived full-time in Gambia, watched a lot of local league players, saw a lot of quality there and then started moving around the world to visit a lot of players, some who were known to us and some double-nationality players to convince them to play for us, like Saidy Janko and Noah Sonko Sundberg.\u201d<\/p>\n

Embed from Getty Images<\/p>\n

Recruitment might be a skill more familiar with club managers, but in recent decades it\u2019s become the territory of a proactive international coach to increase the talent pool of smaller nations too.<\/p>\n

\u201cI travelled a lot and we assembled the team,\u201d Saintfiet says. \u201cI did all the work myself, but I\u2019m used to that. First of all, we have the internet where you can find a lot of players all over the world. If you know the Gambian names\u2026 you can start working on that.<\/p>\n

\u201cThen it\u2019s a case of getting in contact with the player and the club, visiting them, seeing if they\u2019re interested, watching if they\u2019re good enough. We have a lot of players in Norway, Sweden and Switzerland \u2013 we have a few born in England, born in Germany and Scandinavian countries. That mixture helps.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a very intense job and people don\u2019t always see that. I did everything myself and paid for my own flight tickets and hotel costs to travel around and visit players. It\u2019s my passion for the job and my desire to achieve something.\u201d<\/p>\n

With those building blocks in place, perhaps it wasn\u2019t such a big surprise that Gambia made it from the preliminary phase to top their AFCON qualification group ahead of higher-ranked Gabon, Angola and DR Congo.<\/p>\n

If that was meant to be the hard bit done, the debutants were confronted with a host of challenges that punctuated their tournament, making their run to the quarter-finals even more improbable.<\/p>\n

A pre-competition training camp in Qatar was blighted by a Covid outbreak, which left Saintfiet working with a skeleton coaching team and as few as 12 players and no goalkeepers available to take part in training sessions. It wasn\u2019t until four days before Gambia\u2019s opening match against Mauritania that they could play a full training match with a full complement of players.<\/p>\n

After making it to Cameroon, there were further distractions at Gambia\u2019s team hotel in Buea, where soldiers stood guard 24\/7 amid security concerns triggered by friction between the government and armed rebels in the area.<\/p>\n

And the night before their last-16 tie with Guinea, Gambia\u2019s squad was struck down by food poisoning that left several players either unavailable or nursing illness right up to kick-off \u2013 leading Saintfiet to blast tournament officials for not providing AFCON\u2019s smaller nations with the same quality of facilities as the leading lights. But there was no chance of the players letting the setbacks get on top of them.<\/p>\n

Embed from Getty Images<\/p>\n

\u201cAll the negative things and the bad luck we had, we used in a psychological way to become stronger. I\u2019m not a coach who likes to talk about excuses,\u201d Saintfiet counters.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe created the group and in the outside world we made clear that we were underdogs and we were lowly ranked, but inside [the camp] our ambition was to become African champions. We were also realistic, but we were there with ambition and we really wanted to get the best out of it.<\/p>\n

\u201cWith my team, we put together motivational videos of Denmark in 1992 becoming European champions, of Greece in 2004 and Zambia in 2012 becoming African champions. We showed the players them before every match and we really built up a team that had confidence in themselves.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe weren\u2019t there just to be there, we were there to compete with the best and show ourselves as the best side. When we won against Mauritania, there was a big party. I told all the players and staff, every point we won we had to celebrate\u2026 we created a flow and a belief in ourselves and the mental part was very important with that.\u201d<\/p>\n

The run may have ended in the quarter-finals, but Saintfiet\u2019s Gambia were celebrated as heroes back home. Complications with return flights meant only a few players and staff were able to bask in a glorious homecoming, although the impact of the success has been felt nonetheless.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe impact of what we did Gambia was really huge,\u201d Saintfiet adds. \u201cFor Gambians all over the world can finally say \u2018we are from Gambia, not from Zambia\u2019 because there is a joke that people think they\u2019re not from Gambia but from Zambia. But now people have finally started to know The Gambia and it is a huge honour to be part of that and the coach of that.\u201d<\/p>\n

One thing\u2019s for sure, when Saintfiet next returns to Gambia, the greeting will be much friendlier than that night against Togo in 2018.<\/p>\n

For More News And Analysis About Gambia<\/a> Follow Africa-Press<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Africa-Press – Gambia. Tom Saintfiet and his players are under attack, with only a cluster of soldiers standing between them and a group of angry fans. Surrounded by seething supporters all around the stadium, there\u2019s little more the Gambia boss can do but take cover from the objects being hurled his way. It\u2019s 2018 and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":84,"featured_media":10217,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,8,17],"tags":[2368,2355,2361,260,669],"class_list":["post-10218","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-all-news","category-homepage-english","category-sport","tag-afcon","tag-africa-press","tag-africa-press-gambia","tag-gambia","tag-scorpions"],"yoast_head":"\nAFCON 2021: HOW GAMBIA HEAD COACH TOM SAINTFIET TRANSFORMED THE SCORPIONS - Gambia<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Tom Saintfiet and his players are under attack, with only a cluster of soldiers standing between them and a group of ang ...\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/gambia\/all-news\/afcon-2021-how-gambia-head-coach-tom-saintfiet-transformed-the-scorpions\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"AFCON 2021: HOW GAMBIA HEAD COACH TOM SAINTFIET TRANSFORMED THE SCORPIONS\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Tom Saintfiet and his players are under attack, with only a cluster of soldiers standing between them and a group of ang ...\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/gambia\/all-news\/afcon-2021-how-gambia-head-coach-tom-saintfiet-transformed-the-scorpions\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Gambia\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/AfricaPressTunisiaa\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2022-02-06T18:24:54+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2022-02-06T19:12:57+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/static.africa-press.net\/gambia\/sites\/19\/2022\/02\/img-62001d803a914.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"731\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"438\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"cfeditoren\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"cfeditoren\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"10 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/gambia\/all-news\/afcon-2021-how-gambia-head-coach-tom-saintfiet-transformed-the-scorpions#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/gambia\/all-news\/afcon-2021-how-gambia-head-coach-tom-saintfiet-transformed-the-scorpions\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"cfeditoren\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/gambia\/#\/schema\/person\/068c7ab4e9634ae78ec5d54ec46598bb\"},\"headline\":\"AFCON 2021: HOW GAMBIA HEAD COACH TOM SAINTFIET TRANSFORMED THE SCORPIONS\",\"datePublished\":\"2022-02-06T18:24:54+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2022-02-06T19:12:57+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/gambia\/all-news\/afcon-2021-how-gambia-head-coach-tom-saintfiet-transformed-the-scorpions\"},\"wordCount\":1918,\"commentCount\":0,\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/gambia\/all-news\/afcon-2021-how-gambia-head-coach-tom-saintfiet-transformed-the-scorpions#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/static.africa-press.net\/gambia\/sites\/19\/2022\/02\/img-62001d803a914.jpg\",\"keywords\":[\"AFCON\",\"Africa Press\",\"Africa Press-Gambia\",\"Gambia\",\"scorpions\"],\"articleSection\":[\"all news\",\"homepage-english\",\"sport\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/gambia\/all-news\/afcon-2021-how-gambia-head-coach-tom-saintfiet-transformed-the-scorpions#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/gambia\/all-news\/afcon-2021-how-gambia-head-coach-tom-saintfiet-transformed-the-scorpions\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/gambia\/all-news\/afcon-2021-how-gambia-head-coach-tom-saintfiet-transformed-the-scorpions\",\"name\":\"AFCON 2021: HOW GAMBIA HEAD COACH TOM SAINTFIET TRANSFORMED THE SCORPIONS - 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