Personally, the first time I heard Rudolph Kroll speak was a post-match interview that Robert Marawa did with him(Kroll) after a pre-season game of the 08/09 season.
This was one of Kroll's first interviews as a Pirates coach. I am not firm on the exact verbatim that was used but the message was clearly communicated. Robert, enthusiastically, asked... if we likely to see Pirates playing Total football, since Kroll was now the coach at Pirates. Kroll's response was along the line that, Pirates players were not of good (enough) quality so Total football was out of the question. That response has never left my mind. From there I understood that not much is going to be achieved, by the might Buccaneers, under this coach.
Firstly, lets deal with this myth that Krol brought Pirates its first cup in 10 years. Truth be told, Pirates was very lucky to beat Chiefs in that semifinal second leg of the MTN8. In fact, Pirates looked more likely to beat Chiefs in the first leg than in the second leg. Pirates was even luckier to beat Swallows in the final of the MTN8.
When Pirates were cruising to victory, Krol decided to sabotage that position and made a defensive substitute and introduced Ngobeni into the game, too early in the game (I think it was around the 65th minute). Now, Ngobeni is a fine player but tactically that substitution was flawed because it handed the impetus to Swallows and they equalised. Pirates won the game, but the reason was hardly the coaches tactics. Just luck of the penalty lottery. Pirates won the MTN8 despite of Rudolph Krol's presence and not because he was there.
Secondly, as head coach, Rudolph Krol is certainly not in firm control of his team. He has been on the press saying unsavory things about the very players that are supposed to deliver for him. It is important to hasten to admit that some of these things do have a ring of truth to them but saying them the way he does is hardly the stuff that team moral is built on.
Thirdly the team looks disjointed, cases in point:-
1) At Orlando Pirates, coloured players seem to have their own clique. Just look at the way goals are celebrated and conceded.
2) The reported Mayambela, Modise, Rossley incident
3) Andile Jali leaving the field during the Telkom Cup final and the subsequent interview statements by both the coach and the player
4) Krol and Rossley arguing on the bench over substitutions.
On the Jali issue, if you listen to what both him(Jali) and Krol are saying, it exposes Krol’s lack of tactical acumen at game time. In that game, Johannes and Josephs gifted Chiefs a goal. (Mistakes are part of football and we love the two.) Chiefs was playing beautiful football and they had their tails up. Now whatever it is that Jali was doing, it contained Chiefs and (Pirates) also ventured forward dangerously a couple of times.
At the score still 1-0 to Chiefs, from a gifted goal, Krol decides that Jali is a liaibility and is stubborn and pulls him off. From that moment I felt Chiefs could have scored 4 goals if they wanted to.
In summary, there is no human cohesion at Pirates and the coach has reached his ceiling. What you have is a group of very gifted players who somehow get the results despite of the coaches obvious blunders and inabilities. What is happening is that Pirates is displaying sporadic evidence of the possibility of being a great side. Man for man, our players are more gifted than Chiefs players. But Chiefs totally humbled us, not once but twice and there is no reason why they cannot do it again on the 26th of February.
Orlando Pirates is an institution and Rudolph Kroll is tearing it down, brick by brick. It was Mokoena, then Walaza, then Makhanya, then Mdledle, then Segolela, then Mthembu, now Modise. Is Jali next? As fans, who are we supposed to idolize?
The essence of a football team is its ability to capture the imagination of its fans. This is where players become very important. Without the correct football playing characters, no legends can be born. No nostalgia, of a period, in club's history, can be derived. Results alone are not enough for such fondness of memories.
Just ask Real Madrid coaches. We want to be number one and we want to do it beautifully. To many of us, even number two is acceptable, especially if we are doing it beautifully. With Kroll, we are neither.
To Pirates management, we thank you for your dedication to the crossed skull and bones. The intention of starting this group is not to be controversial or to bring disrepute to the club. But it is to lets fans tell you what you already know.
And that is, a good section of the Sea Robbers is not happy about the way the coach is managing that team. Maybe you, as management, are happy. But as fans, we are tired of, every day, hearing about drama that is coming from Milpark and Johannesburg Stadium. And it always revolves around the coach.
*The Chiefs game is used as an example because it was, the one, mostly watched.*
By Ntombiziyabusa Bhengu
