By Mark Gleeson
BBC Sport, South Africa |
 Grobbelaar became a legend in English football with Liverpool |
Zimbabwean Bruce Grobbelaar is delighted to be back in football after two years working on an anti-malaria awareness programme around southern Africa.
The former Liverpool goalkeeper, once known as the clown prince of football for his eccentric antics, signed a two-year contract to coach South African premier league club Manning Rangers on 21 July.
"It's fantastic to be back, I have wanted to get back into the game for a while now and this is a great opportunity for me," he said.
"Two years is a long time in the footballing wilderness and I think if I had stayed out of football any longer, I would have missed the boat for any future coaching jobs."
Grobbelaar, who turns 47 in October, had been working for the World Health Organisation, travelling extensively around southern Africa.
"I contracted malaria myself four years ago and it took 62 smears before they found out what it was," he said.
 |  I could not turn this opportunity down |
"If I, with a reasonable level of fitness, had such a tough time getting a proper diagnosis, then what chance has a young child in Africa got?
"It was important to get around and participate in the campaign."
Nevertheless, the former Zimbabwe international is now fully focussed on his new coaching job and is determined to help the Durban-based club improve on their twelth place finish in the 16-team premier league last season.
"A finish in the top eight is realistic but I'm looking at sixth place and above," Grobbelaar said.
"The club had the material last season and I can't understand why they didn't perform.
"But I'm making changes that will, hopefully, turn things around."
Rangers play their opening game of the new South African season on 11 August and face four of the country's top clubs in their next matches.
 Grobbelaar was cleared on match-fixing charges in 1997 |
"It is a baptism of fire," laughed Grobbelaar, who is no stranger to pressure at the top of the game.
As a goalkeeper with Liverpool, he won six first division championships and three FA Cup winners' medals and was the first African international to win the European Cup in 1984.
Rangers, who are based in the city where Grobbelaar was born, are the fourth club he has coached in South Africa, whose league has recently been rocked by the arrest of 33 referees and officials in a crackdown on match-fixing.
Grobbelaar himself will forever be dogged by match-fixing allegations from his playing days in England, but he has also earned a reputation for being put into struggling clubs and helping them avoid relegation.
He achieved this feat with Cape Town clubs Hellenic and Seven Stars as well as the Pretoria team SuperSport United.
While coach of Hellenic two years ago, Grobbelaar also played for eighteen minutes of the club's last game of the 2001/2 season in a self-awarded farewell.
Aged 44, he thus became the oldest player to play in the South African professional league.
Recently, Grobbelaar was also linked with coaching job of Zimbabwe's national team, a role he has filled on a caretaker basis on three occasions.
"I gave them my input on what I thought could be done with the national squad and the chairman of the football association said they were looking to maybe appoint me in October," he said.
"But I could not turn this opportunity down."
MMIX
E-mail this to a friend 
Printable version 