About Almountakhab Moroccan newspaper-Written by: Badr Al-Din Al-Idrisi
We are not surprised by the points that Wydad has obtained in the first three rounds of the professional championship, to collect four points out of a possible nine, by achieving a win, a draw and a loss, and we cannot exaggerate matters, because this Wydad that appeared to us this season, all those who represent its bases and pillars have changed, the captain is new, the technical captain is new and the players are new, and therefore nothing at all imposes that Wydad should be as bright as the full moon, as strong as a hurricane, and as impregnable with its collective performance as it was in the seasons of beautiful and dazzling harvest.
And Wydad Athletic Club concluded last season to the rhythm of zeros, and the house complained of a major crack, there was a need and the circumstances of the imprisonment of President Said Naciri, required that a time period that is the strongest in terms of titles should pass, for there to be a quick intervention that would preserve the edifice from collapsing completely.
You will say, this Wydad, the impregnable edifice with its historical depth, is not shaken by the mere blowing of such malicious winds, for how many times has the nation’s Wydad gone through dark moments like this, the hurricane struck the house, but it did not get anything from it because it is fortified by history, men and an inexhaustible legacy, so it was necessary to replace it at all levels.
Hicham Ait Mena came out of the hole of Mohammedia, carrying like a knight the smile of life, and his arrival to Wydad as president coincided with premeditated planning, that the golden generation of Wydad, with which Said Naciri became the president most crowned with national and continental titles, had completed its time cycle, and there was no choice but to build a new team.
Hicham Ait Mena was smart in choosing the captain of the stage, which is in fact a construction stage, as the young South African Roland Mokwena is a fan of beautiful football that is based first on possession and then on the organized construction of the attack, so it was easy for him later to be precise in choosing the players he brought in, even though their number reached record levels, unprecedented in the history of Wydad.
A semi-reconstruction of the Wydad home, so the question that occupied us and the supporters was, how much time does Mokwena need to give his team spirit, personality and playing identity?
What I personally witnessed in the three matches, against Maghreb Fez, Moghreb Tetouan and Ittihad Touarga, are the harbingers of the birth of beautiful football, a state of labor that precedes the completion of the playing body for it, and cases of obstruction accompany Wydad in all these matches, the question arises how much patience is in Ait Mena’s chest and in the chests of Wydad fans?
And to what extent is Mokwena able to implement his tactical idea in a record period of time, as long as his presence with Wydad always puts him under pressure of results?
Those who know very well how to build a new playing identity, with its multiple systems, especially when the players are all new and come from different football environments and with different tactical cultures, and what is the estimated time to implement this philosophy that must match the team’s genes, see something taking shape in the sky of Wydad, and they are certain that judging a coach based on three matches is a crime against the coach and an injustice to technical norms, but would these people tell us how much time Mokwena needs to teach his players his philosophy?
