Monday, May 01, 2017
PS TNI Sack Hatton After Victory
It is traditional in football to offer congratulations to a coach when his side wins a game. After two home draws and a win away to Bhayangkara last time out despite ending the game with nine men PS TNI found themselves temporarily in third place in Liga 1, giddy heights for the mostly young team and their French coach Laurent Hatton.
If Hatton though was expecting an extra meatball in his morning bakso he was sadly mistaken. Nope. He's gone, He is an ex coach. PS TNI have replaced him with Bulgarian Ivan Kolev who has extensive experience in Indonesia with the national team, Persija, Sriwijaya, Mitra Kukar and Persipura over the years.
Following Hatton out the door are two of the foreign players in the team, Aboubacar Leo Camara and striker Aboubacar Sylla who got on the scoresheet at the weekend. It seems the three came in on the same package whatever that means. Get one coach, get two players free perhaps? Following Kolev in are two Argentine players Leonel Nunez (an attacking midfielder who had a short stint in Malaysia with Johor Darul Ta'zim) and defender Facundo Talin.
So, why this dramatic turn of events when things seemed to be going so well? Apparently Kolev knows Indonesian players well and Hatton doesn't. Kolev speaks the language, Hatton doesn't.
Begs the question of course why Hatton was appointed in the first place. It was clear to anyone with access to the internet the French coach had never worked in Indonesia before and, ergo, didn't know the language,
Much like the recent sacking of Hans Peter Schaller by Bali United, apparently club and coach didn't share the same vision whatever that means, we will probably never know the truth but both incidents will do nothing to raise the image of Indonesian football among players and coaches abroad.
# posted by Me @ 5:01 PM 
