Kavazovic: Serbian coach leading race to succeed Kaze at Yanga SC

Tanzania giants Yanga SC are closing in on Serbian coach Nikola Kavazovic to replaced Cedric Kaze.

Goal can exclusively reveal the 45-year-old tactician is among the favourites mentioned by the club’s technical committee to replace Kaze, who was fired alongside the entire technical bench last Sunday.

The Burundian coach was shown the exit door after the team drew 1-1 against Polisi Tanzania but the draw came after the team had suffered their first defeat of the season - 2-1 against Coastal Union three days earlier.

According to a source in the team, Kavazovic, who has coached a number of clubs in Africa including Kenya’s AFC Leopards and Botswana’s Township Rollers, has been picked as the coach to take over the vacant role in Jangwani and will arrive in Dar es Salaam soon to start work.

“At least 45 coaches handed in CVs to replace Kaze and I can confirm the technical committee met on Wednesday night to check out the CVs and they have already zeroed in on Kavazovic to come on board,” the source, who did not want to be named, told Goal on Friday.

“The committee was impressed by the CV of the Serbian coach and what also impressed them more is because he has already handled teams in Africa and they feel he will have no problem settling in when he arrives at Yanga.

“I just want to tell you, he is the one leading the race, his name has also been forwarded to the club’s bosses so they can start planning his travel schedule and they want to use the international break to sort out the coaching problem at the club.”

Kavazovic started his coaching career in 1996 with BASK Belgrade. Besides BASK, he also worked as a youth and senior coach at BSK, Zarkovo, Borac, and Resnik.

Ahead of the 2017-18 season, he was appointed as the new manager of Township Rollers in Botswana, and in the first season in Africa, Kavazovic won a ‘double’, both the Botswana Premier League title and Mascom Top 8 Cup.

Besides his local achievements under Kavazovic, Township Rollers became the first-ever club from Botswana to reach the group stage of Caf Champions League and ironically, he achieved the feat against Yanga after they beat them 2-1 on aggregate, winning the home game 2-1 and drew 0-0 away in Tanzania.

Rollers were drawn in Group A with Al-Ahly of (Egypt), Esperance de Tunis of Tunisia, and KCCA FC (Uganda) but Kavazovic resigned after his first game, a 1-0 victory over KCCA.

He then came to Kenya and signed to handle AFC Leopards for the 2018-19 season but he left the FKF Premier League outfit a day before the season started, claiming he was heading back home to take care of a relative who was ‘unwell’ and never returned, only to resurface at South African club Free State Stars weeks later.

The 45-year-old left South Africa at the end of that season and rejoined Rollers in November 2020.