Jamal Sellami is the new coach of Jordan, succeeding his compatriot Houcine Ammouta this week. The two men, whose professional careers resemble an eternal coming and going, belong to a generation of coaches who learned their trade in our good old Botola, before exporting their know-how abroad.
And the crisscrossing with two common denominators – the FUS and the local national selection – continues between Houcine Ammouta and Jamal Sellami. The first made his debut in his training club, IZK, with which he played an exceptional 2007-2008 season, concluded by a runner-up place to AS FAR, before joining the structured and ambitious project of FUS. At the time, the Rbati club, which was languishing in the 2nd division, needed a breath of fresh air. Ammouta, who had been through Fath as a player, had the profile for the job.
A young executive, who knows football inside out and has mastered the new governance of a club that is set to serve as a model, Ammouta found the perfect terrain to put his ideas into practice. Through seriousness and rigor, he ended up putting FUS on the best track, with a return to the elite in 2009 and a historic Throne Cup-CAF Cup double the following season, before handing over to Jamal Sellami in 2010-2011 and leaving to live an enriching experience, on a professional and personal level, in Qatar.
Sellami took his first steps in coaching as an assistant at Raja, before striking out on his own at Union des Touarga, DHJ, then Hassania d’Agadir. A linear journey which ended up arousing the interest of the FUS. The rest of the story, everyone knows it: an exemplary course during the 2011-2012 season, which flirted with excellence, despite losing the title during a decisive match against the Moghreb of Tétouan. The former Atlas Lion ended up joining the DTN as manager of the local selection, which was to play and win the 2018 CHAN at home. Titillated by the desire to take on other challenges, Jamal found his Raja, with whom he won the Botola in 2020 and reached the semi-final of the Champions League. Last but not least, he also took the Green Eagles to the final of the Mohammed VI Cup in 2021.
Oddly enough, it was Ammouta who succeeded him, brilliantly, at the head of the local selection during the CHAN 2020. Four years later, it is in Jordan that the know-how of these two men continues to develop. Ammouta served as a scout there, with a 12-month experience, punctuated by the final of the 2023 Asian Cup and a qualification for the final round of the 2026 World Cup qualifiers. Sellami is now called upon to continue the work of his predecessor and friend born in Khemisset.
The two technicians do not really have the same conceptions of the game. They do, however, have a number of common denominators, including seriousness, rigor and passion for their profession. They are also the best ambassadors of the know-how that our technicians have acquired in particular thanks to the efforts of the FRMF. The latter has in fact increased the number of training courses with the contribution of internationally renowned experts.
The ideal would now be to activate another lever: insert an article into the cooperation agreements with the African federations concerning the contribution of Moroccan executives. The idea would be to imitate the Spanish and French models which have taken this direction, with the presence of executives from these two countries almost everywhere in the world, so that the “Made in Morocco” label of excellence is not limited not just Ammuta and Sellami.
