Advice to Bertille and Lincoln

February 25, 2004

The most crucial and spinal piece of advice anyone can possibly give to the two men now placed in charge of T&T's football is this: pay no heed to anything the sycophants of the T&T Football Association (TTFA) has to say about the game and about "administration" in general.

The TTFA has been the most detrimental factor to the development of our football. They understand nothing. The major elements in that organisation have not been able in over two and a half decades to conceptualise and institute on the ground a proper, integrated development plan for our football beginning with the 10-year-olds at primary school level.

They have surely talked it, held seminars ad infinitum about it, but have not had the will nor the patience and tenacious focus to implement what is required. They are exemplars of the particular sickness that plagues this society.

In a recent column, titled "Deep malaise," we intoned that "...material accomplishments are secondary and incidental, merely the 'bells and whistles' and not the spinal centre of what 'development' is meant to be. Our deep malaise lies in our failure to comprehend the science of how things develop and that affects our approach to all that we do..."

The TTFA stands accused of consciously and unconsciously scuttling all past efforts, including their own, geared towards the implementation of development plans because of their obscene obsession with shortcuts to glory, with "bells and whistles," with international ratings, with short-term benefits that may have brought some financial returns, but moreso, attention and acclamation unto themselves.

At every stage when we should have been concentrating on implementing a system for football development at whatever costs, we ended up, time and time again, wasting, not "wasting" but "ill-spending," tremendous resources on hosting prestigious world tournaments that contributed little or nothing to our developmental process.

Probably no other country in the world has hosted more international youth tournaments than T&T, certainly none as small as us. Only business investors have gained from such goings-on.

All that has happened is that individual local talents have been showcased to the world and as a result T&T probably per capita has the most "football stars" playing professionally abroad.

Of course, the local business investors, including some officials of the TTFA, who finance the local clubs, are the ones who profit handsomely when individual players are offered lucrative contracts with foreign clubs.

True to say, neither prestigious tournaments nor individual lucrative contracts abroad have redounded to the development of our football. In fact it seems to have worked towards the deterioration of our football.

In the same column quoted above, we said the following:

"...In the '60s and '70s our football development was on par with countries like Mexico, Costa Rica, Columbia, etc. In the 1974 campaign we defeated Mexico handsomely. But like everything else, instead of putting the proper scientific systems in place to keep apace with world developments in football, we implemented nothing, instituted no visionary plans, and soon every other country in the CONCACAF region went ahead of us including countries like Canada and the USA..."

Haven't we noticed that Jamaica has shirked this insane approach? They have hosted no international tournaments. They have not hastened to put down physical infrastructure over and above their present needs. They have never sought to place the cart before the horse.

Their athletic development programme is a wonder to behold. Mckinley and Wint returned from the 1948 Olympics and 1950 World Games and began to implement a programme for the development of Jamaican athletes.

Today there is in Jamaica a virtual "factory" that churns out world-class athletes in every category as a matter of course, while T&T stumbles and starts in fits, producing probably one every 20 years.

When Simones, the Brazilian, was brought to Jamaica to handle their football, he was given responsibility for all levels from age five to the senior team; all the coaches at every level were brought together to hammer out a system which Simones directed.

Still today in T&T every coach does his own thing and as players move from one age-group to another they become more and more confused. The difference in approach to development was made quite clear last week.

With much hype, that in most instances reeked of dishonesty and deception, the T&T senior team engaged a Brazilian team. It was billed as "Soca versus Samba." It turned out to be a fiasco with some "big-belly" over-the-hill Brazilians, certainly not a team, they did not even have a "bench," running around against a T&T national team, many of whom were only recently called out of retirement. Get serious!

Those big-belly Brazilians probably were enticed to come here for the Carnival. And while we were having fun in the illusion of matching a "Brazilian team," Jamaica was defeating 2-0 a full-fledged Uruguay team complete with the likes of Diego Forlan and company.

In addition to our advice to Bertille and Lincoln not to be caught up with the antics of the TTFA, we wish to point out that you do not begin a campaign with retired or soon to be retired "stars," that's hype to bring out crowds.

You must begin with the under-23s who, led by Kevin Carter and others, have defeated in recent times all clubs on the local scene as well as all versions of a senior team.

Insist to the TTFA that you start with the under-23s and take charge of all levels of football throughout the communities of T&T or else you will only be spinning top in mud with or without Yorke and Latapy. In fact our view is that these two should be brought in not merely as players but as assistant coaches and professional advisers.

Work with the TTFA but maintain your integrity, and distance yourselves as much as possible from their obsession with "bells and whistles," which in the past has led them to treat players so shabbily, as if they are mere pawns to be shoved around on a chess board in this serious game called life.