AS we await a formal briefing from the Guyana Football Federation (GFF) pertaining to the national team’s performance at the recently concluded Gold Cup which was held in the USA, one can’t help but wonder what is taking the entity so long to conduct what should be standard procedure.

After all, there was a plethora of releases from the GFF urging the nation’s support for the team from layman to corporate community which they got entirely.

What is the delay now in hosting a forum to give details about the team’s performance and what their first appearance meant for the sport locally?

In light of several examples of the absence of reviews of national teams’ performances in the past by this current administration, one is tempted to believe that the entity’s behaviour borders on disrespect for all stakeholders.

While, we know that the body comprises persons of esteem, the pattern of behaviour being displayed could easily erode the earlier stated belief.

The non-release of the selection of national Beach Futsal team, their subsequent departure and return, a non-review of the Under-17 performance at CONCACAF tournament, are all vivid illustrations of the Federation’s contempt for stakeholders or their lack of understanding of their mandate.

Both head coach and president should see it fit to host such a meeting to shed light on whether there were positive or negative gains regarding our appearance in such a high-profile competition.

Let all Guyanese who rallied around our national team be given the opportunity to make their own assessment of the coach’s disclosure about the team’s performance as well as those from the president relating to what was derived that will advance the sport’s development locally.

The chance is there for them to either win over more support or simply leave it up to us to interpret their actions as discourteous.

The ball is in their court and what next move they make will determine whether the sport continues to decline in terms of spectator support or whether the nation remains optimistic about their future.

The present administration has become very unpopular among the rank and file, (fan support) as evidenced by the repeated low turnout at even the Elite League, while gossip of iron-fist rule is taking centre stage.

Another dislike is the current composition of the team which is dominated by players who have been residing all their lives outside of Guyana at the expense of locally based players.
We get the point that countries have begun to embrace this practice, but not to the magnitude that Guyana is doing it.

There is little or practically no chance of local development which is opposite to what the head coach and GFF have been bellowing to stakeholders.

Neil Danns, by virtue of his three goals, was the standout for us at the Gold Cup, but would the scouts be coming to Guyana in search of more players with similar ability?
The answer is no because a quick search on Google would reveal that he did not hone his skills here hence the prospect of such an occurrence would be lost.

As long as there is the continued imbalance in team selection, the probability of locals breaking onto the international scene will remain low.

One just had to look at how out-of-sorts one of our young budding talents, Pernell Schultz, looked when he was presented with the chance to take the field. He subsequently spoke of the need to expose more locally based players regularly on the international stage; it could surely help their development.

The head coach appears more inclined to make his work easy by selecting players he is familiar with, while his long absence from these shores is not helping local development. Spending time to understand our culture and what motivates us to offer more support should be an unconditional assignment for him.

It will help him immensely in his deliberations when picking a national team because if the trend of overloading Guyana’s ‘Golden Jaguars’ with an abundance of foreign-born players continues, the time might be nigh when local players start to decline offers of selection.

The grapevine has it that local players’ presence on the team is more shambolic than genuine, and very soon they will realise this if they haven’t done that already.