National coach Nees reports
©ZIFA
At the end of 2024 and the turn of the year, we have taken some of our interview highlights from the last twelve months out of the archive. We published the article about our conversation with Zimbabwe national coach Michael Nees about football in different African countries in September.
“Football has an incredible importance in Africa,” says Michael Nees. The 57-year-old from Karlsruhe should know. He carried out football development work in many places, such as South Africa. He looked after the national teams of Seychelles, Rwanda and more recently that of Zimbabwe. After Reinhard Fabisch, Rudi Gutendorf and Klaus-Dieter Pagels, Nees is the fourth German selection coach in the country of the Zambezi and Victoria Falls. In an interview with Transfermarkt, he talks about his sporting experiences in African football.
Nees went through the DFB coaching course in 2001 with colleagues like Christian Streich, Mirko Slomka and Michael Frontzeck. However, he did not then focus on the Bundesliga like Freiburg icon Streich or the busy Slomka and Frontzeck, who worked as head coaches at five and six German clubs respectively. Nees was more attracted to the unknown; he landed early in South Africa, later in Japan, Kosovo, Israel and the East African island paradise. On this occasion he soon came into contact with his later adopted home of Zimbabwe. “I played my first international game as a coach with the Seychelles in Zimbabwe in 2003,” says Nees. “I was naive back then and thought there would be maybe 5,000 people in the stadium at the game.”
Instead, the arena was already packed with 60,000 spectators during the warm-up. Nees remembers: “People joked back then that 20,000 more spectators would have accommodated the entire population of the Seychelles in the stadium. The atmosphere there was incredible and unique. Even back then I noticed that the country was crazy about football.”
Michael Nees has been Zimbabwe’s national coach since July 2024. ©ZIFA
21 years later, things have come full circle. Nees is back in Zimbabwe, he says: “I’m sure if the largest stadium in the world were here in Zimbabwe and we had an international match at home, it would be filled to capacity. Against any opponent – no matter how big.”
Nees about his time in the Seychelles: “Land of absolute contrasts”
From 2003 to 2004 Nees was national coach of the Seychelles and from 2006 to 2007 selection coach of Rwanda. Both stations are associated with formative and strange experiences. “In 2003, the Seychelles were still a country of absolute contrasts,” remembers Nees.
He adds: “On the one hand, the most beautiful five-star hotels you can imagine, on the other hand, an enormous shortage of foreign currency or basic goods for us such as electronic devices or baby seats for the car. What we take for granted in Germany is still a luxury in many African countries today. I remember that the Seychelles national players obtained foreign currency by traveling abroad and quite a few of them got on the plane after away games with the flat screens or a microwave oven that were being released at the time and told me that they absolutely had to buy these things there because it was There was simply no such thing in the Seychelles. When there were away games, I always gave myself a day off to go shopping. This made the players happy, motivated and the solidarity was great,” says Nees with a laugh.
“During my time, we were in a two-week training camp in Germany sponsored by a private person,” Nees continues, “but to our surprise, not in a hotel, as we had actually imagined, but in a kind of self-catering youth hostel. The players therefore had to be divided into groups at short notice and inevitably. One group was responsible for cleaning, one for washing up, one for cooking. I was very worried that the mood would change at some point and the team would explode, but I always said that if we got through this, we would become an absolute unit. Proper team building in real life, and luckily everything went well. This was then also reflected on the field. For example, we won 2-1 against Zimbabwe, who had an incredibly great team at the time and were well over 100 places ahead of us in the FIFA rankings. In 2003 we were the eighth best promoted team in the FIFA world rankings. And that with the smallest country in Africa and no major sponsors. That really made me proud.”
Nees: “Football players in Africa generally have a greater capacity to suffer”
Nees also remembers special moments in and with Rwanda. He says: “In Rwanda in 2006 I was supposed to build a new and young national team, but it should only consist of players from the local league. During this time I experienced for myself how big the word loyalty can be in Africa. My goalkeeper coach told me one day, during a training camp on the border with the Democratic Republic of Congo, that his younger brother, who was keeping goal for the U20 team, was sick but he didn’t want to leave because he felt committed to the team. The next day I found out that his brother was very ill and dying in the hospital. I stood there stunned and immediately asked him to pack his things and drive off. His brother died on the way home. That still affects me today. We also beat Liberia 4-0 in a qualifying game a few days later for him.”
A lot has changed in African football in recent years to become more professional, explains Nees. He says: “Football players in Africa generally have a greater capacity to suffer. They sacrifice a lot to achieve social advancement and to get closer to their goal of professional football. There were players in the Seychelles who worked on a farm until midday before international matches, came two hours before the game, changed, played the game and then performed. I remember situations with Rwanda where hotels that had actually been booked for an away game were not booked and we were left without accommodation at two in the morning. Even when we were standing at airports completely exhausted when flights were canceled, my players simply lay down on the floor and slept there. However, conditions in Africa are getting better and more professional everywhere. Also with the support of CAF and FIFA. This is no longer comparable to what it was 15 to 20 years ago.”
Nees says he is impressed by the family solidarity in Zimbabwe. “For example, our association headquarters is temporarily still a normal rented house. Every day we cook in the kitchen and eat together, like in a large shared apartment. I’ve never experienced anything like this.”
Nees sees great football potential with Zimbabwe
Fundamentally, working in African countries also changed his view of life. Nees pays more attention to the little things and interpersonal interactions. “If there is something that has influenced me on the African continent, it is the joy of life and play,” he says. “I’m sure many of my colleagues feel the same way. During our training sessions in Rwanda we were accompanied by a little boy who was missing a leg. Nevertheless, he didn’t let himself get down and with incredible joy he retrieved every ball that was shot over the goal. He flew around with his wooden crutches at a breathtaking pace, unbelievable. You can still see children on the streets today making soccer balls out of banana peels, plastic bags and other things and playing with them.”
While his previous coaching positions in Africa with the Seychelles and Rwanda have not played a particularly important role in pan-African football, Zimbabwe belongs to a different category. The “Warriors” have already qualified for the African Cup five times, most recently in 2022. The objective is therefore clear: qualification for the tournament taking place in Morocco next year. In the first qualifying games a few days ago against Kenya (0-0) and against Cameroon (0-0), Zimbabwe was able to score its first points. From coach Nees’ perspective, his team has great potential, but has recently suffered from a few injuries to top performers.
With Marshall Munetsi (Stade Reims), Jordan Zemura (Udinese Calcio) and Tino Kadewere (FC Nantes), three regular players from Europe’s top leagues are part of Zimbabwe’s squad, with Marvelous Nakamba (Luton Town), Munashe Garananga (FC Copenhagen), Andy Rinomhota (Cardiff City), Tawanda Chirewa (Coventry City) and Tawanda Maswanhise (FC Motherwell) there are other professionals active in Europe. “Many people may have the misconception that when you become a national coach in a country like this, everything happens casually,” states Nees. “The pressure that exists here is just as great as in Europe. And the expectations are perhaps even greater, even if important regular players are missing due to injuries.” 40 journalists were present at his first press conference.
The biggest challenge as a national coach is to do as much as possible with the players in the limited time available. Nees says: “The international match calendar is packed to the gills. I therefore see myself as a trainer who is also required to be a trainer and structural developer. Of course my goal is to be successful with the national team. But I still want to leave a positive footprint and lay the foundations from which my successors can also benefit.”
Interview by Henrik Stadnischenko