Togo coach: ‘I’m back!’

He’s on again. Pfister is set to rejoin Togo’s national soccer team as coach three days after he resigned and on the eve of its opening World Cup match against South Korea.

“He will be there as coach (today),” Togo soccer federation spokesman Messan Attolou said yesterday, adding that the news of the decision had boosted the team’s morale.

The news came as a much-needed morale booster for the Sparrow Hawks, which are ranked 61st in the world and are the outsiders in the Group, which includes France and Switzerland.

Pfister stormed out of the team hotel early Saturday morning in disgust at the federation’s failure to agree to pay bonuses to the players, who had staged repeated no-shows at training sessions. The 68-year-old German initially refused entreaties from the players to return and in repeated media statements said he would not rejoin the team because of the payment row.

Pfister’s son and agent, Mike, told FIFAworldcup.com that Pfister had agreed to rejoin the team as “a matter of the heart.”

The coaching carousel has confounded Togo’s opponents and left the team in chaos.

“The mood is now superb,” Attolou told said. “Initial attempts at phone conversation were drowned out by loud music on the bus carrying the players back from training at Frankfurt’s stadium.

“We are partying,” Attolou said. He said Pfister was due to arrive yesterday evening from his home in Zurich, Switzerland.

It was unclear whether the dispute over bonuses had finally been settled.

The players, most of whom are with smaller European clubs, have been holding out for euro155,000 (US$200,000) each to play in the tournament, plus euro30,000 (US$39,000) each per win and euro15,000 (US$20,000) per draw.

The Togo government last Friday sent the equivalent of about US$730,000 in liquid cash through its diplomatic bag to Germany, as part of a deal worth about US$40,000 per player, officials in Togo said yesterday.