Football - Ulric Mathiot named national team caretaker coach |15 April 2014

Ulric ‘Keker’ Mathiot has been appointed caretaker coach of the Seychelles national team by the Seychelles Football Federation.

Mathiot, who has had stints as head coach before, takes on the responsibility following the departure of Dutchman Jan Mak.
The SFF informed the Seychelles Nation newspaper that coach Mak decided not to renew his contract for personal reasons.

A member of the Seychelles team who won the silver medal at the first Indian Ocean Island Games in Reunion in 1979 and having coached both St Louis during the regionalisation era and Sunshine under the club system, coach Mathiot will work with assistants Vivian Bothe and Cliff Nolin.

Former Grand Anse Mahé goalkeeper Danny Laurette is the goalkeeper coach and Michel Albert the team manager.
Speaking to Sports Nation, coach Mathiot said following coach Mak’s decision not to renew his contract, the SFF called on him as SFF technical director to prepare the country’s national team ahead of their involvement in the African Nations Cup 2015 qualifiers on an interim basis.

“Since the team won the Indian Ocean Islands Games gold medal in 2011 under coach Ralph Jean-Louis, the country’s national team have known at least four head coaches. It shows that the team did not have an identity as each coach has his own philosophy of the game. We are trying to correct this by implementing the squad development programme. We have football academies in all secondary schools, the SFF under-16 team play in the third division and the under-17 squad are involved in the second division championship. We also have an under-20 team but players on this team play for different clubs,” said ‘Keker’.

He added that his first training session was last night with a pool of players who had already started training with the national team.
‘Keker’ noted that new players could be called up depending on the playing strategy the coach team will adopt.

The Seychelles under-20 team played against Ethiopia two weeks ago and lost 0-2 at Stad Linite.
The draw for the qualifiers of the African Nations Cup in Morocco from January 16 to February 7, 2015 will be held in Cairo, Egypt on Sunday April 7, 2014.
 
The first leg matches of the qualifiers will be played during the weekend of May 16-18, and the second leg matches are slated for May 30 to June 1.
The qualifiers shall be played in the format of several preliminary rounds as well as a group phase with seven groups consisting of four teams each. The two top teams of each group will then directly qualify for the Orange African Nations Cup 2015, along with the third place winners of the seven groups.

The group phase shall be held from September 5 to November 19, 2014. The final phase’s draw shall be conducted on November 26, 2014 in Morocco.

Out of the 51 countries engaged in the qualifiers, the top 21 teams listed in the Confederation of African Football (Caf) ranking shall automatically qualify for the group phase. The seven others taking part in the group phase shall be determined following the conclusion of the preliminary rounds, held from May to August 2014. The 21 teams that will automatically qualify for the group stage are Nigeria, Ghana, Côte d’Ivoire, Zambia, Burkina Faso, Mali, Tunisia, Algeria, Angola, Cape Verde, Togo, Egypt, South Africa, Cameroon, DR Congo, Ethiopia, Gabon, Niger, Guinea, Senegal and Sudan. Hosts Morocco are also in the group stage.

The 30 team to be involved in the preliminary round are: Libya, Equatorial Guinea, Botswana, Malawi, Uganda, Mozambique, Benin, Sierra Leone, Congo, Central African Republic, Zimbabwe, Kenya, Liberia, Gambia, Rwanda, Tanzania, Namibia, Burundi, Lesotho, Guinea Bissau, Madagascar, Chad, São Tomé and Príncipe, Seychelles, Comoros, Mauritius, Swaziland, Eritrea, Mauritania, South Sudan.
Meanwhile, in the preliminary round involving the four lowest teams, Mauritania edged visitors Mauritius 1-0.

G. G.