Running a football club and an academy comes at a big cost, but it's a challenge Daniel Cardoso and his partner Brandon Barkhuizen have bravely taken on, with their senior side currently competing in the lower leagues.
As he heads closer to the end of his playing career, the Sekhukhune United defender Cardoso and his partners have gone about unearthing the talent of tomorrow with their academy and club. This is a project that they started over two years ago and they have made some good progress since then.
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"We are running under Italian Club. We went into partnership with Italian Club and we run the academy. We go from grassroots level all the way to under-17. We compete in the Easterns League under Italian Club and we have the senior status with the Hollywoodbets Regional League (formerly SAB League). It's called Olympia. It's a project that we thought we would take on. I only know football, so I thought I would stay in football and starting the academy with Keagan Ritchie and my partner Brandon Barkhuizen. We started about two-and-a-half years ago," the 35-year-old Cardoso said to the Siya crew.
"We started helping out kids and the parents started asking for competitive football. We decided to take the next step and last season was our first season competing in the junior levels of the Easterns League. We competed from under-6 until under-17. Then Brandon and I decided that we want to venture into the amateur league and see where we can go and what we can do. It's been good. It's now our first season in the Hollywoodbets Regional League and we are sitting sixth. So, we are not doing too bad there. We want to start sending players for trials. We want to start placing players that we know are good enough in the NFD and in the PSL. It's for our youth. We believe in the youth."
Cardoso and his partners have got big plans for the academy and, even though it's costly, they are prepared to fork out their own money for now while searching for sponsors to support their dream. They will be sending their coaches to get coaching licenses to ensure they are all qualified to work with the youth players. They don't want to take any short cuts on the way to the top.
"It's a stepping stone for us. Maybe next season if we get the right sponsors and we get people coming on board, we can pump a bit of money and make a step up into the ABC Motsepe League and start making our way up like that. It's a venture that I wanted to go along (with). Unfortunately, I am not as involved because I do a lot of travelling. Brandon is the one involved most of the time, but when I am around, I coach the boys and give them inspiration.
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"People see money-making in academies, but it's not the case. You fork out a lot of your own money to keep it surviving. We are sending our coaches for the D-license because we want our coaches to have qualifications. We want to be above the rest and not a fly by night. We want to be something big."
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