A new chapter for Collin Benjamin

NAMIBIA’s most successful professional soccer player Collin Benjamin returned home from Germany earlier this year to start a new chapter in his life with the aim of helping talented Namibian soccer players to make the grade in Europe.

Benjamin had an illustrious career playing for German Bundesliga side Hamburg SV for 10 years before becoming an assistant coach with second division side 1860 Munich. He however gave up a promising coaching career to return home and embark on a new dream of building a football centre to help groom Namibia’s new generation of footballing stars.

“I was an assistant coach at 1860 Munich and I had a good salary, but I decided to come home because I want to help someone else to follow their dream, ” he said.

“I’ve been there and know what is needed to succeed at the highest level we just have to get a football centre here in Namibia to help the youth to succeed in Europe. It’s going to be difficult and I have to identify young boys to work with, but I’m determined to start the centre, ” he added.

Benjamin said the football centre would need two artificial pitches, a gym and a full time physiotherapist while he had the backing of some friends in Germany.

“There are quite a few people managers, agents or ex players who are willing to come into this. But for me it’s a calling and more a case of what I can I do for my country in stead of what my country can do for me, ” he said.

“Now I’m looking for an appropriate place to build the centre and I am busy negotiating with people. I’m really sincere about this, I have to do this and I wont stop until it’s done. The first artificial pitch has to be done within a year, that’s the dream, ” he added.

Following his dream

If Benjamin’s achievements as a player are anything to go by, one can assume he will make a success of his latest venture. Last week he gave a motivational speech to FNB Namibia employees in which he touched on his great career, the obstacles he had to overcome, and his mental strength and driving force to reach the top.

Benjamin was born and bred in Katutura and the hard realities of growing up surrounded by poverty made an indelible mark on him from a young age.

He had a special talent for soccer and as a young 13 year old already found his goal in life.

“I remember when the Brave Warriors lost 4 0 to Zambia in 1992, I was reading about the match in Die Republikein and they referred to some of the Zambian players as ‘beroepspelers.’ I asked my mom what it meant and she explained that they were professional players, playing soccer for a living. I couldn’t believe they were getting paid to play soccer, so then and there I decided that’s what I want to do. So my vision and the path I had to follow started there. ”

Collin started working on reaching his goal, and by the age of 16 he represented Namibia for the first time at u17 level. Three years later, in 1998, he made his senior debut for the Brave Warriors but his goal of becoming a professional player remained as strong as ever, and the following year he decided to go to Germany to follow his dream.

“I was put in touch with an agent in Germany, Joe Francken, so after some correspondence I bought a ticket and flew to Germany to meet him. I was only 21 and weighing 68kg and he just laughed when he saw me, but he took me to a youth hostel and I attended some trials with a third division team. The other guys were however all stronger and faster than me and within a week my dream was dead, ” he said.

Collin had told everyone back home that he was going to become a professional player so he knew he couldn’t go back, and decided to persevere. He asked Francken to find him a team, any team, and eventually he joined a fifth division team.

“They got me a small room with a sleeper couch and the first game we won they bought me a TV. After our second victory they bought me a VHS machine, and that is how I started furnishing my room. They paid me 400 Mark per month, which came from the gate takings so I was literally paid in coins, ” he said.

Collin was determined to succeed and worked hard to achieve his dream.

“In those years, when the other guys were stronger and faster, I trained on my own, I ran in the forest and trained in the gym. I was determined to break the poverty cycle that I grew up in, that was my main motivation. My grandmother was a cleaner at the Katutura hospital and my mother was a general worker at a chocolate factory. So I was just thinking that I had to break the poverty cycle so that my kids would not have to go through that one day, ” he said.

Collin’s hard work started to pay off and at the end of the season he moved with his coach to a fourth division team, Empshorn. His big breakthrough came when they played Hamburg’s second team and after a great performance, in which he scored a goal and made another in a 2 all draw, he was approached by Hamburg’s assistant coach.

“After the match their assistant coach gave me his card and asked me to call him. I was so excited but I managed to keep a straight face and after a day I called him. He took me around Hamburg’s stadium with state of the art facilities and asked if I wanted to join them, so I signed up with Hamburg. I was earning 3 000 Mark per month and my head was in the stars, ” he said.

Collin soon started training with the first team players and after impressing the coach he was signed up to the first team, receiving a vastly improved salary.

“I was a shy guy and normally I just kept to myself because I didn’t want to be noticed, but on the field I was a fighter. My weight increased to 75kg, I became strong and after a while my coach said he was happy with the way I had adjusted. He said they wanted to keep me there and offered me 15 000 per month I couldn’t believe it, I tried to remain cool but inside I was jumping for joy and when I got home I called my mom, saying ‘I’m rich, I’m rich, I’ve made it.’ ”

Collin however realised that it was just the beginning and he had to work extra hard to stay at the top.

“That was just the beginning. It’s tough to reach the top, but to stay there and go further, thats the challenge. Just two years back I was still washing dishes at my first club, but now if I wanted to live like a lion, I had to work harder and be stronger, ” he said.

Benjamin said the analogy of the lion and the springbok was a big motivational factor in his life.

“Every morning when I wake up I ask myself if I want to live like a lion or a springbok. Both wake up and both have to eat the lion wants to eat the springbok, so the springbok has to run and can only stop when the lion is tired. Am I going to have to run like the springbok or am I going to wait for the right moment to attack. I always asked myself why am I doing this, and that’s where my mental strength comes from, ” he said.

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