As much as Greenwood Athletic’s head coach Lionel Miller has been tasked to transform his team into a competitive and title-challenging unit, he also has a responsibility to blood the next generation of stars.
And so far, it is safe to say that Pony, as Miller is known, has already obliged with his first objective by steadying the Greenwood ship since his re-appointment a month ago.
When Miller took charge, the Retreat-based club was languishing in the second-last position with one win from 11 matches.
Subsequently, Miller showed friend and foe why he was brought back winning four of the next six games with two ending in defeat and leapfrogged Jomos Power, Trinitarians, Camps Bay FC, Woodlands United and FC Hout Bay, in the process to 12th.
Last week, Miller started to show glimpses of his next plan when he unveiled the second part of his objective with the introduction of the 16-year-old youngster Adnaan Peters.
Miller pointed out that they have quality juniors at the club and it was high time to start throwing them into the proverbial deep end.
“Bringing the next generation in will not be that difficult ” Miller told No Bones with Jones. “Peters is one of so many who can step up if they work hard enough. Naanie, as he is well known, will be a future star in his own right if he puts in the hard work on training and it’s so hard to miss it.”
Peters debuted during their 4-0 drubbing of Trinitarians in front of the Solo Street faithful and did not disappoint.
“I think I was more nervous for him but he told me, it’s just another game coach,” Miller further explained. “I just wanted him to go out and do what he does best and he did it with such maturity.
“I am very excited for him and obviously for the next juniors to step up. All the praise goes to the players as you can see they put in the hard work – it was just to get the mentality right” Miller concluded.
