The South African coach who recently took charge of the Young Africans of Tanzania, Manqoba Mngqithi, is set to take the team to another level in the Caf Champions League next season.
Mngqithi (55) did not renew his contract with Lamontville Golden Arrows, which he led to finish sixth in the Betway Premiership log. He was hired by Young Africans last week, replacingof Pedro Soares Goncalves from Portugal who was fired at the end of last season.
Yanga, one of the biggest teams in Tanzania, has won the league title, the Tanzania Mainland Premier League for two seasons in a row. Eat it in the season of 2024/2025 and 2025/2026. It will return to the Champions League in the season of 2026/2027.
Although Yanga is doing well in the domestic league, it is still a long way to go in the Champions League. It still reaches the quarterfinals of this tournament. It achieved this in the 2023/2024 season since it started playing in 1997.
Even last season, this team was kicked out of the Champions League even though they managed to defend the league title.
The CEO of Yanga, Andre Mtine, sees Mngqithi, who has coaching experience in the Champions League, who can bring change to this team.
“Coach Mngqithi has undoubted experience in coaching. While we were considering what kind of coach we need, we felt we should get a coach who has coaching experience in Caf competitions.
Mngqithi has coached in the Caf Champions League before. That’s why we consider him as a high-level coach,” said Mtine, quoted byThe Citizen of Tanzania.
“We have been successful for five consecutive years in the local league but now we want to take another step and do even better in the Champions League. We have reached the final of the Caf Confederation Cup once in the last five years, so we want to continue to do well in the Caf competitions, especially in the Champions League.
To be able to achieve this, we need an experienced coach with a proven track record. So we believe that we have found the right coach, who will be able to take the team to another level in this competition. His coaching style impresses us, it matches that of Young Africans, and African football.”
Mngqithi, who worked for a long time at Mamelodi Sundowns as Pitso Mosimane’s deputy, was there to win the Champions League in 2016 and when it reached the semi-finals in the 2018/2019, 2022/2023, and 2023/2024 seasons.
He is the second South African coach to coach in the Tanzanian league. Another one is Steve Barker who is in Simba SC