Coaches Corner: From Small Town to Big City Life 

Much like the miners of years gone by, the ‘City of Gold’ has always had an allure for small-town migration into a city known for bright lights and big attractions. 

The current head coach Marco Engelbrecht of King Edward VII, a former old boy of the school who hails from the small mining town of Thabazimbi, found himself travelling a fair distance away from home to attend one of South Africa’s premier all-boy schools. 

During his time at the school which spanned from 2008-2013, he represented the First XV as fly-half for several seasons where he represented The Red Army with pride.

He was part of a talented squad which had maintained a good record which included some big wins over rivals Jeppe High School for Boys and Pretoria Boys High School.

He played in the same side as current South African hooker and World Cup Champion Malcom Marx, where they played together in 2011 and 2012. 

He has maintained a relationship with his former teammate and has organised that he comes back when not on national duty to present new first-team players with their first XV jerseys – a nice way for current schoolboys to draw inspiration from. 

After six knee injuries that sidelined the talented Lions u19 fly half from pursuing a professional playing career in the sport himself, he needed to look at a change in direction in terms of a career path. 

He turned to coaching where he felt that he would be able to help guide and nurture the next generation of talented individuals which he is well-positioned to do. 

Marco started off his career coaching at the prep school at St David’s Marist Inanda in 2014, before making the move across to his former school in 2017 to take on coaching responsibilities at King Edward VII. 

Having worked his way up the ranks, the coach found himself in the assistant coaching position for a period of two years, before taking on the head coach responsibilities in 2021. 

On the topic of coaching mentors that have played an important part in his career thus far, he was quick to answer with one name, which was former Blue Bulls player and the current Sharks Defense Coach, Joey Mongalo. 

“Joey took me under his wing in the coaching world, he definitely laid the cornerstone on how I want to approach the game as a coach and mentor to players.” 

However, Marco is very much his own coach, as he looks to grow his own brand of coaching. His philosophy when it comes to his coaching style is, “ I have a real care principle for my players, with a focus on keeping it very simple by optimizing his players’ ability to see where they can reach their potential.” 

Outside of rugby, he sees the value in on-going education, having seen the benefits from it in his own career having suffered from a long run of injuries which halted his playing career, picking up a BA in Sports Psychology from the University of Johannesburg and a Postgraduate Certificate in Education. 

When asked about how he sees his role as coach and the importance of finding balance with education, he believes that rugby can be used as a tool to help further develop a players career in the sport, even if the players don’t go onto making it onto the big stage – there are so many other opportunities within the game. 

“Education is as important as the game. At King Edward VII we have a great program to assist the boys with making sure that they achieve off the field in their academics through the assistance of creating study schedules and helping the boys obtain the necessary scores to get them into the tertiary education system.” 

With a jam-packed season of fixtures, Engelbrecht believes that he is fortunate with the current crop of players that he has at the helm, working with such a diverse group of individuals and trying to shape them into a team. 

He is looking forward to watching how his players from last year will grow as 9 out of the 15 players from the starting XV make a return which includes several talented players that represented the school year. 

The likes of South African Schools hooker Esethu Mnebelele along with fly-half Vuyo Moyo, who the coach has been working with on improving his kicking game are set to play important roles this season.

With the KES Easter Festival wrapping up over the weekend, The Red Army ended the festival with one big win against Bishops 45-8 on the final day but lost a hard-fought match against Paarl Boys’ High going down 22-7.

As the season draws on, it will be interesting to keep tabs on the coach and see where his journey takes him – the future looks bright for one of the upcoming coaches in the schoolboy rugby scene.