New Beginnings: Luqman A. Kabange

A while back, the founder of this blog designated a spot for a new talented poaster to exist within this formidable burgeoning community. I auditioned. The result is that now I am at the mortuary drafting my first ever piece on BallerzBantz. There's nothing bad going on, I'm only at the mortuary because the quietness here is best for writing. It's still creepy though.

With this post I present myself to this community.

Who am I?

I'm but a random boy from Tanzania. Born to a lecturer and a secondary school teacher. Now studying clinical medicine at Kibaha College Of Health And Allied Sciences.

With regards to football, I was an enthusiast. Bound to the game by way of blood, the same blood coursing through the veins of my family. Ounce by ounce every bit of it was and is still cursed with the burden to uphold family rituals including love for the game. This enthusiasm was held up until I met one of the smartest people I know in Tanzanian football, George Ambangile.

The beginning.

George offered me the needed inspiration to smartly embark on the journey towards football professionalism. At that time, it was mainly analysis and description after football matches. Through his great work on mainstream media, I spiked higher aspirations.

From an average fan, I developed the need to delve deeper and acquire more indulging, extensive and applicable knowledge of the game. This prompted the search for reliable learning sources; social media posts, video contents, blog posts were all taken into consideration and have played a great part in shaping me into who I am today.

I veered away from mere enthusiasm for the game as it was not enough to quench the wild thirst within. Description and analysis were too vulgar for my liking. Football in my eyes was much deeper and condensed to exist in such a shallow form. I wanted more.

The quest led me here. At one of the best football blogs. At BallerzBantz.

Why am I here?

Simply put the main reason is alignment. I had ambitions to one day join the host in producing similar quality content. The simple auditioning process suggested, at least in my head, that I was a fit for the spot thus I auditioned. Luckily, the host saw the potential within this average boy from East Africa. For that, many thanks to him.

Here's a more detailed overview...

1. I joined for the existing similarities and alignment in between: from former posts; the thought process, approach, base principles and tone seemed somewhat similar to mine.
2. I joined for apprehensiveness: first for my own thoughts, through brainstorming and sharing to an audience I believe is capable to consume and formulate inferences from what I produce. In turn, making me better. Secondly, I wanted to be on the other side of this learning curve.
3. I joined for a stage: this blog provides a surface for me to tease and play with hypotheses. Through this blog I get to test, refine, re-assess and tune ideas. Acquisition of newly proved hypotheses, now raw truths, allows me to apply methods and principles in football and other domains. Hopefully the same will be for the readers.
4. This blog is an archive: it offers a curated method to store and if needed retrieve any formerly formed conclusions. Our penny little minds are too weak to grasp and remember every thought. Writing and archiving to get better is the solution.

The baseline.

Football is but a part of life. For most, a simple recreational part of it. With this thought in mind, I employ an approach to solving both life and football.

The host has previously advocated on successful immersion in one domain to derive principles that can be used to govern life. I, while alluding to this belief, propose a new, perhaps a bit complex version of this belief.

I believe in using life as a derivative for principles to apply in football. Football helps me refine what little experiences I've had in life; the lessons are then broadened to a scope that allows complete immersion in both football and life.

This is the core main theory in practice right now.

Why BallerzBantz?

Well, I have no particular valid reasons. This is mainly sentimental. I like this blog. I like the host. So here I am, ready to learn, unlearn and share with anyone out there.

It might seem stupid to be sentimental, but I am human, and I prefer for it to stay that way. I want to feel what I feel. So, I encourage sentiment.

How do I see my future?

As of now, description and analysis are a very minor part of my football life, I do it for entertainment. My goals as of now:

(i) Know more than I already know, keep grinding, sourcing, reading then rinse and repeat.

(ii) Get to know and learn from some of the best people in the industry.

(iii) Share what I learn with football folk around the globe.

(iv) Acquire an expertise in the process: this seems to get altered as days go by. Still not certain but I am close.

(v) Apply life principles to better understand both life and football.

(vi) Enumerate core individual principles along the way.

(vii) Get better every day: this is why I started and keep on writing about football.

(viii) Improve football around the continent: bridge the gap between African football and football at the highest level. This is the main grand long-term goal.

What to expect?

Here I will uphold and stamp what the blog has been about since its introduction. Only that this will be in my voice. What I write will be my thoughts. I will constantly reference, dispute and sometimes even condemn previous posts on the blog because as I said this will be me, non-affiliated with the past. In this tenure, I will try my best to keep producing relevant quality work for the audience. Support is highly appreciated, in any form, whether a reply, a question or an email.

What next?

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