Gor Mahia technical bench was disbanded not sacked, says Bwana

 By ROBIN TOSKIN

Gor Mahia Secretary General George Bwana has lifted the lid on the circumstances of the sacking of the entire K’Ogalo technical bench on Monday.

Gor Mahia fired Cameroonian coach Anaba Awono with all the backroom staff on the back of three straight defeats to Ferroviario de Maputo in a Caf Confederation Cup, Muhoroni Youth, and Karuturi Sports.

In a Simba Super Soccer programme to be aired at 8pm tonight in Supersport channel 219, Bwana, sharing the same stage with former assistant coach Ken Odhiambo he helped fire, says "there was too much going on in the bench".

"There was infighting within the bench yet when we asked some of them individually whether there were problems they wouldn’t tell us. But you could see there was a problem with fielding of players. That is why we disbanded the entire technical bench," Bwana says in the programme.

Asked by programme host Carol Radull whether by saying "disbanded" he meant "sacking", Bwana cheekily says: "Let us set the records straight here. No one was sacked. The technical bench was disbanded."

Former Gor Mahia coach Anaba Awono (in specs) with members of his technical bench during a KPL tie. [Photo: Stafford Ondego/Standard]

"Seriously, they were on three-month probation and when they turned in three losses and one win in four competitive matches, we felt we could not wait for 25 more days to the end of the probation. We disbanded the bench!"

"Clearly you could see they were not pulling in the same direction yet we were being taken round in circles."

Odhiambo, however, fires back accusing the officials of dictating the line up and tactics to the technical bench.

"Ahead of the Karuturi Sports match we had practiced a 4-3-3 formation, but minutes to kick off an official calls to say Gor Mahia have never played that formation you’ve got to switch to 4-2-2!"

Gor ended 1-0 losers thanks to a Jacob Omondi 90th minute goal with a lobbed Hugo Nzoka header the only attempt on Karuturi goal.

"How do you expect to win with such interference on the technical bench?" Odhiambo poses, to which Bwana fires back: "Those are details we wanted to hear from you! We asked you, we gave each one of you to speak his heart out but you didn’t. I’m surprised that you say that now!"

Odhiambo, however, warned Gor Mahia must change their attitude and give coaches a free hand if they wanted success.