A young female soccer coach who resides in Dawn Park is doing a remarkable job by managing a team that competes with well-established in teams in the City of Ekurhuleni.
Refilwe Ntenjwa had always dreamt of being a sports medical doctor, but due to her academic marks not reaching an adequate standard, she decided to be a coach.
She established the club in 2015 while she was still on varsity, but she had to leave it because of her other personal convictions, regardless of that she returned to adopt the club in 2019. The club comprises of different divisions from under 13 up until 19.
The young coach outlined her main objective in establishing this team called Refilwe 21 FC which is located in Dawn Park.
“Frankly I have this desire to nurture young boys, when I established the team back in 2015 my vision was to grant young talented boys an opportunity to showcase their talents and build their soccer careers, I had to leave them because of my other convictions but I returned to the team in 2019 and I registered them under a new name which is Refilwe 21 FC.
“Soccer is a highly demanding sport to manage and it needs funds, my main challenge currently is that I’m not sponsored which makes things harder for me as a coach. Last week we played against a well-established team called Boksburg FC; it is fully equipped in terms of technicalities and resources, so my only concern is that we can’t compete with such teams without sponsorship.
“Fortunately Dumisani Banda who has a company (Bakcor) which is established in Swazi land promised to sponsor our team.
“In a country that is advocating for women empowerment, as women, we are still subjected to patriarchal structures, so it is not easy to venture into any career path as a woman without fighting the status quo first. It’s even worse in soccer because it is dominated by men; I find it difficult to reach my full potential in it. I think the system in South Africa doesn’t serve any justice for us, because we are given opportunities as women not on merit but out of pity and it doesn’t reflect well on us.
“However my future plan is to take the team beyond its limits, I want it to have its own signature code as a brand, like the other big teams that we compete against.
By Matampane Raymond Mokwena
