Akbar Nawas

Mohamad Akbar Bin Abdul Nawas[1] is a Singaporean football coach and Head Coach of Udon Thani in Thai League 2.

Akbar Nawas
Personal information
Full name Mohamad Akbar Bin Abdul Nawas
Date of birth (1975-11-28) 28 November 1975
Place of birth Singapore
Team information
Current team
 Udon Thani
Senior career*
Years Team Apps (Gls)
1998–1999 Marine Castle United
Managerial career
2016–2017 Tampines Rovers
2017–2018 Global Cebu
2018–2020 Chennai City
2021–2022 Balestier Khalsa
2022 Udon Thani
2022–2023 Udon Thani (Sporting Director)
2023– Udon Thani
*Club domestic league appearances and goals

He was the head coach of Tampines Rovers in 2016 and led the team to the runners up position in the League. The team scored 52 goals in total, of which 30 goals in 12 games were scored in the second half of the season when Nawas took over. He also led Tampines to the Singapore Cup Final and emerged as runners-up and was a semi-finalist in the League Cup, where he introduced the reserve team players as most of the players from the first team were away with the national team. They lost to eventual winners Albirex in the League Cup semi-finals. He first joined as the assistant coach for the first team of Tampines Rovers under the then current national coach V. Sundramoorthy. Nawas' expertise is the attacking approach in football; this helped Tampines Rovers team to dominate possession in almost every game during his term as head coach and reduced the gap of seven points to only one point, guiding the team from fourth place to second place in the Singapore League. He prefers to use a 4-1-3-2 formation.

Playing career

Nawas captained the Professional Club side Trywhitt Under-19 side to third Place. He also played for the Singapore Under-19 and professional club side Trywhitt senior team. As a football player, Nawas was called up to play for the Singapore Pre–Olympic team and the national team for Under 23s and U19s.[2]

From 1998 to 1999, Nawas played for Marine Castle United in the professional Singapore Football League. He was then called up for training with the National "A" team for the Dunhill Cup after his stint with Marine Castle United. In 1999, he had an ACL operation and stopped playing competitive football. He joined the compulsory military service in 1996 and played football in the Police Force Home team. In 1995, Nawas started to play professionally in the Singapore Football Professional teams and he was called up for the Singapore Pre-Olympic and Jakarta Squad team respectively.

As a child, football became the life of Nawas. At the age of 10, he played in the junior and senior level of the Macpherson Primary School from 1985 to 1987. And from 1988 to 1992, Nawas played in the "C" and "B" Divisions for Macpherson Secondary School.

Nawas has an advanced diploma in business administration from University of Wales and has finished his degree in business administration and marketing from the same university.

Coaching and managing career

Nawas was the head coach of one of the top football clubs in the Philippines, Global Cebu Football Club starting in mid-June 2017. After the launch of the Philippine Football League in April 2017, Nawas became the technical training consultant and later on was offered the post of a head coach, the first Singaporean coach to handle a football team from the Philippines. Global Cebu Football Club made history as the first Philippine football club to reach the finals for the Singapore League, double firsts in the history of football in both countries. In 2016, Coach Nawas was the head coach of Tampines Rovers Football Club's senior team. Before taking this highest post in the east side football club in Singapore, he was the assistant coach for Tampines Rovers senior team in the Singapore League in 2015 and the head coach for the U21 Reserve team who emerged as champions in the Reserve League. In 2014, Nawas was the assistant coach to the technical director and coach in the National U21 and at the same time, the youth development manager for the Football Association of Singapore from 2011 to 2014. While doing his share of work in the FAS (Football Association of Singapore), Nawas assisted head coach Fandi Ahmad in training and as a match analyst for the Lions XI in pre-season (predominantly a U23 team with ten senior players, playing in the Malaysian Super Professional League) in 2013. And the year before, in 2012, he was the head coach for the National U14 team for an Invitational Tournament in Japan from April to June 2012.

Tampines Rovers

Nawas was appointed as head coach of Tampines Rovers FC in May 2016[3] in the middle of the 2016 S.League season taking over from V. Sundramoorthy who was appointed as head coach of the Singaporean national team.[4] He led the club to a quarterfinal finish at the 2016 AFC Cup and was knocked out of the competition by eventual runners-up Bengaluru FC. Tampines Rovers finished as runners-up in the 2016 S. League season and the club was eligible to participate in the 2017 AFC Champions League qualifying play-offs. They lose against Filipino club, Global FC in their first match thus failing to advance in the play-offs. Nawas resigned in January 2017.[3]

Global Cebu

In May 2017, it was reported that Nawas joined Global Cebu F.C., who participated in the inaugural season of the national professional Philippines Football League, as a technical consultant.[5] He then helped the club in their 2017 AFC Cup match against Home United FC. After about a month, he was appointed as the Filipino club's head coach, taking over from interim coach Marjo Allado.[4]

Chennai City FC

In March 2018, he joined I-League side Chennai City FC as head coach. Akbar, who was the former technical consultant of the club, takes over as the head coach from V Soundararajan after The team had finished a disappointing eighth position in the 2017–18 I-League.[6] In his first full season, he helped Chennai City overcome all odds to win the 2018–19 I-League season.[7] He gained lots of praise and recognition for his work with the team, and his contract was renewed for the 2019–20 season.[8]

Balestier Khalsa

On 22nd October 2021, Akbar was announced as the Head Coach of Balestier Khalsa,[9] succeeding Marko Kraljevic, who left a week prior. According to a club statement, Akbar has penned a two-year contract “worth more than S$170,000”. However, less than 1 year into the contract, Akbar would tender his resignation, and join Thai League 2 side Udon Thani FC,[10] less than a week after a record 6-1 win against Hougang United.

Statistics

Managerial statistics
As of 30 April 2023.
Team From To Record
G W D L Win %
India Chennai City 20 March 2018 22 June 2020 45 21 11 13 046.67
Singapore Balestier Khalsa 22 October 2021 31 August 2022 22 6 2 14 027.27
Thailand Udon Thani 1 September 2022 18 December 2022 16 2 2 12 012.50
Thailand Udon Thani 17 February 2023 Present 12 3 1 8 025.00
Total 95 32 16 47 033.68

Honours

Managerial
Chennai City

References
  1. "Match Summary - Tampine Rovers v. JSW Bengalaru FC (AFC Cup 2016)". Asian Football Confederation. 21 September 2016. Retrieved 17 October 2017.
  2. Nayak, Nicolai. "From juggling jobs to being a football coach: The fascinating journey of Chennai City's Akbar Nawas". Scroll.in. Retrieved 8 May 2020.
  3. "Akbar Nawas steps down as head coach of Tampine Rovers". Asian Football Confederation. 28 January 2017. Retrieved 22 June 2017.
  4. "Former Tampines Coach Akbar Nawas takes over at Global-Cebu". ESPN FC. ESPN. 21 June 2017. Retrieved 21 June 2017.
  5. Osman, Shamir (15 May 2017). "Global FC rope in former Stags coach Akbar as technical consultant". The New Paper. Singapore Press Holdings Ltd. Co. Retrieved 22 June 2017.
  6. "Chennai City FC appoint Nawas as coach, Barcelona's Villa named assistant". timesofindia.com. 20 March 2018. Retrieved 19 October 2018.
  7. "Chennai City sweep I-League awards". theshillongtimes.com. The Shillong Times. 21 March 2019. Archived from the original on 21 March 2019. Retrieved 29 October 2020.
  8. Jayakumar, Vikram (1 July 2020). "The Midfield Maverick Realizing his Footballing Dreams: An Exclusive with Chennai City FC's Sriram". soccerkakis.org. SOCCERKAKIS. Archived from the original on 3 December 2022. Retrieved 12 March 2021.
  9. "Akbar Nawas takes charge at Balestier Khalsa - Football Association of Singapore". spl.sg. Retrieved 18 August 2022.
  10. Auto, Hermes (18 August 2022). "Football: Balestier Khalsa coach Akbar Nawas set to leave SPL club for 'unique' Thai challenge | The Straits Times". www.straitstimes.com. Retrieved 18 August 2022.
  11. "Chennai City Crowned I-League 2018-19 Champions After Win Against Minerva Punjab". Press Trust of India (PTI). NDTV. 9 March 2019. Archived from the original on 27 June 2020. Retrieved 27 June 2020.
  12. Dutta, Raja (29 March 2019). "The 2018/19 I-League End of Season Awards | Sportsbeatsindia". Archived from the original on 20 June 2020. Retrieved 27 March 2021.
  13. "The 2018/19 I-League End of Season Awards". The Away End. 13 March 2019. Archived from the original on 7 November 2020. Retrieved 27 March 2021.
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