PRESIDENT of the Guyana Football Federation (GFF) Wayne Forde, on Sunday informed Chronicle Sport that the May 24-28 Caribbean Football Union (CFU) Women’s Caribbean Cup has been postponed until further notice.
“There’s a lot happening at the CFU,” Forde said, but did not go into details as it relates to the reason the tournament was shelved or when it will be played.
However, Forde said that the postponement affected the GFF’s programme, stating, “It’s affecting the hiring of a female coach because we did put out that advertisement, and we have a lot of good applications.”
The GFF had encamped 25 local players ahead of the CFU women’s championship, with the hope of seeing more local players involved in the Lady Jags squad, even though, according to Forde, Guyana’s women’s programme is not in a state to have predominantly locally based squad; a sentiment that was echoed by the federation’s Technical Director Ian Greenwood.
“The women’s national team is the country’s most successful team and we owe that the girls who are playing overseas,” Greenwood stated, adding, that absence of more local players on the squad resulted from a neglected system in the past.
Greenwood, who will serve as head coach of the women’s team in the interim, noted that over time and with the continued development programme, the Lady Jags will see more local players in the line-up, but, given the high standard of play with the overseas-based team in the collegiate and professional leagues in the USA and Canada, that will take some time.
When the GFF hired Mark Rodrigues in 2010 to resuscitate the country’s women’s football programme, players with heritage ties to Guyana who are playing collegiate and professional league were assembled.
Rodrigues, due to the lack of any properly organised women’s football league and matches, was forced build a roster with predominantly overseas players.
The Lady Jags in 2010 had qualified for the CONCACAF Gold Cup; a feat that is yet to be accomplished by the Golden Jaguars (male senior national team).
Facing Trinidad, hosts and eventual winners Mexico and Canada, Guyana failed to pick up a win, but put the world on notice that Lady Jags will be a force to be reckoned with in the Caribbean.
Despite reaching the penultimate round of the 2014 FIFA World Cup Qualifiers the ‘Golden Jaguars’ are yet to feature in a major CONCACAF/FIFA tournament.
However, in-fighting and a stagnant GFF, which led to the installation of a Normalisation Committee in 2014, saw the team miss several regional and international tournaments between 2010 and 2014 until the Clinton Urling-led body decided to bring Rodrigues for a second stint and this time the team reached the Olympic Qualifiers.
The Lady Jags had qualified for the CONCACAF Olympic Qualifying in Houston, Texas, where they were grouped with Canada, Trinidad and Guatemala.
Guyana went down to Canada (5-0) and Trinidad (6-0), but won their first game at a CONCACAF tournament when they defeated Guatemala 2-1.