Ntshebe gains valuable lessons from US stint
Calistus Kolantsho | Friday June 12, 2020 10:41
Ntshebe was given a short period to train with the best squash players at Dread Sports Academy owned by Lefika Ragontse. The academy is based in Baltimore, Maryland.
Ntshebe left for the USA in December and returned to Botswana in March.
He told Mmegi Sport that his stay in Baltimore was about exploring available opportunities in the sport.
“There are opportunities but someone has to take the lead and become a slave to the whole education process of coaching and learn from the more developed countries,” he said.
“It is a thing I wanted to do for a long time. Look, we are behind and we need to catch up and the only way to catch up is to get into their camps and systems and take notes and find that weakness.”
Ntshebe also said he met with Ragontse in 2019 during the European Junior Squash tour to Germany and Netherlands. Ragontse had brought some players from his academy from USA.
“So he offered me help naturally, because he is a Motswana and he wanted to see his fellow countrymen become successful as well. We planned together how we could traffic our players between USA and Botswana going forward to expose them to more possibilities. That is how my journey started,” Ntshebe explained.
Ntshebe said his experience in the USA was humbling because he realised that Batswana have more abilities and talent but lack work ethic unlike the Americans.
“They have resources and facilities in abundance but do not have the natural physical abilities like we do not, even close. They work hard to become athletes. It is serious for them like nothing else matters,” he said. Ntshebe said attitude made it easy for him to work with them.
However, he said it was taxing as he had to be organised and accurate with information, time and programmes.
“You have to keep improving daily as a coach, which is good because there are so many good coaches in the USA and to find yourself on court with an athlete, it is like a privilege. They can go anywhere because they have the money to do that anytime. So the experience is the best thing I have come across so far,” he added.
He said other countries have better incentives than Botswana, right from school up to professional level.
“You see sport is used as a tool to get into higher education from Form One. Sport has a meaning now. It is no longer just education, it must be accompanied by a healthy individual who has some sort of team sport accomplishments,” he added.
He said it was time for change in Botswana to make sense of the hard work from down up.
“Everything I do is all about squash and there is no how I could distance myself from the national agenda, which is all about the podium. We should work hard to turn our athletes into professionals and in the process making sport a worthwhile activity to pursue,” he said.
Ntshebe said returning to the USA is an option because of the countless opportunities the wealthy nation presents.
“There is a lot to learn that side and perspective of things you get is priceless. But it would be hard coaching against your own people in any situation or level. For now I remain home,” Ntshebe said.
For his part, Ragontse said he sponsored Ntshebe, together with four players, Theo Pelonomi, Antonio Tawana, Kaone Siwona and Micky Joseph to travel to USA.
He said the idea was to give them an opportunity to train and see the best players in the world.
“Ntshebe came to learn what it takes to train at the highest level. It is always good to help fellow brothers and show them what is possible,” Ragontse said from his Baltimore base.