Pitso Mosimane finally spoke out about his departure from UAE Pro League side Al Wahda, revealing that it was not solely due to the results. In an interview with SAFJA members, Mosimane said several factors led to his exit, including a clash of visions.
South Africa’s most decorated coaching export had been brought in to help the club win the league title, but he could not achieve the goal.
Pitso Mosimane joined Al Wahda following his successful stay at Al Ahli, a club he guided to promotion into the Saudi Pro League.
But his tenure at Al Wahda proved to be the shortest of his coaching career, ending without any trophies with six wins and four losses in 10 games. He left the team within the title race, five points behind the leaders after eight games, and Al Wahda remained in the league cup.
MOSIMANE REFLECTS ON AL WAHDA TENURE
“I must say the vision, as I always say, the project was good because it was a team that hasn’t won the league for 13 years, and that’s been the challenge. That’s what brought me to the place,” said Mosimane.
“So there was an opportunity to win the league there at a big team and we were all aligned in that vision. So that’s what made me go there. It’s a big team in Abu Dhabi; there are other big teams in the UAE, of course, but it was something we were looking forward to. “But you’re right (it was a short stint). I think inside the vision of looking to win a trophy we need to win the league; there are principles and alignment that should be short-term, mid-term and long-term plans.
OTHER SOCCER NEWS:End of the road for Pitso Mosimane at Al Wahda
“There must be a way to be aligned in knowing the short-term and mid-term plans, that within that space we should be able to say yes, this is the plan, this is achievable quickly, and there’s no plan that’s perfect, even when you win a tournament, there are headaches. “But once we’re inside the same vision, I think there was a lack of alignment from my thinking and what [Al Wahda] wants, in what the team has been doing for the last 13 years where they haven’t won the league.”
DIFFERED ON HOW TO DO THE WORK
“I realised we weren’t going in the right direction, not only with the vision – it’s not about if the coach is right or wrong because before we agreed, we sat down, you know, and I asked if you would fire me for winning, or am I leaving you for winning,” he said. Mosimane, a winner of 19 trophies, including three CAF Champions League titles, added: “To be honest, it was obvious it wasn’t about results. We won the last two games in a row, and the team that beat the last 4-0 is the team I beat 8-0, so I mean… you don’t need to be clever to understand what happened in that match.
“You want to drive the vision by doing 1,2,3, and we as a team want it 1,2,3 – so I said I have to stay with what I know, I have to stick to my principles that won trophies we achieved, we won the league last season – we wanted that to help us. “We’ve been successful for the last seven, eight years, winning trophies, and they’ve not won anything for 13 years, so I think we should be going this way. They think the other way: we liked each other, happy with each other, no problem with work, we’re winning. “But we differed on how to do the work. It was the best thing to part ways, the best thing for the team. It was good for me to come out as early as possible.”