FOR THE PAST 23 years, football clubs in Guyana and to an extent some in Trinidad and Tobago and even Barbados, looked forward anxiously to the yuletide season, wherein they are given an opportunity to compete in the Kashif and Shanghai Football Extravaganza, a

tournament that is viewed by many as our local ‘World Cup’.
Many of Guyana‘s talented players, such as the two elder statesmen of the game Charles ‘Lily’ Pollard and Clive ‘Hitman’ Hercules, Randolph Jerome, Nigel Codrington, Trayon Bobb and Gregory ‘Jackie Chan’ Richardson, represented their clubs with pride at this tournament.
In fact, clubs have been playing hard to qualify for the tournament, by winning or even placing in the top three of various tournaments being held under their various sub-associations or even the governing body for football in Guyana, the Guyana Football Federation (GFF).
Now in its 24th year, co-Directors of the Kashif and Shanghai Organisation stated they will not be hosting this year’s edition of the tournament, if GFF grants permission to the Georgetown Football Association (GFA) to host their event during the same timeframe.
Speaking at a press conference held at the Waterchris Hotel on Waterloo Street, co-Director of the K&S Organisation Kashif Muhammad stated, “If the Georgetown Football Association (GFA) is given permission to hold their tournament during that period, we will not be running our tournament. It’s disrespectful to sports fans and to us. We built this time from zero,” said Muhammad.
He added, “You would not see in 2016, when the FIFA World Cup finals is being held in Brazil, a derby taking place in England between Manchester City and Manchester United. Neither will you see in the USA, when Serena Williams is taking on Maria Sharapova in the US Open, the Australian Open is being played alongside it.
Because these same players will be needed for the tournaments and the outside world is bigger than Guyana and has more money than Guyana, yet you will not find this occurring, so why must we encourage it here, when we built Guyana’s football from this tournament.”
Asked if the Kashif and Shanghai Organisation is prepared to accept another time period to host their event, Muhammad stated, “If we are not given this period, we will not be accepting any other time period. If nothing happens we will get seriously into school football in December like last year.”
Muhammad further stated, “The reason why we can’t have a parallel tournament is because we want to have the best teams in the country. The event was built on having the best teams involved and against this backdrop, that’s why having a parallel tournament is not feasible.”
According to Muhammad, the Kashif and Shanghai Organisation continues to negotiate with the federation to stage the tournament and he noted that if the tournament is being held, it would be starting in mid-November with 24 teams divided in eight groups of three competing in a round-robin format.
He said, “All teams participating in the event will receive $250 000 preparation fee and that clubs who make it to the knockout stages will each receive complete team kits.”
“They will also be an increase in prize money, totalling $13M which will be broken into $6M for the winners, $4M for the second-placers, $2M for third-placers and $1M for fourth-placers. We will also be giving away the motor car for the Most Valuable Player and the motorcycle for the most valuable coach,” added Muhammad.
He further stated that the organisation identified the prerequisites to the GFF that would be difficult to achieve while elaborating that the Guyana Football Women’s Association, which the tournament plans to go through, has not been contacted by the federation.
“Unfortunately we are less than satisfied with the posture taken by the GFF. It should be noted that their failure to respond to our second letter, resulted in us writing CONCACAF,” added Muhammad.
Questioned about the letter sent to CONCACAF and if any response has been forthcoming, Muhammad said, “We have not gotten any official response from them. Shanghai has been talking on the phone with CONCACAF president Jeffrey Webb and they are supposed to meet”.
He noted that if CONCACAF were to rule in favour of the Federation, the organisation will still not change their stance of moving their tournament.
“Yes, we would share the same sentiments. The Kashif and Shanghai Organisation built the Golden Jaguars. We invited scouts and Jamal Shabazz to Guyana and under Shabazz, we saw Guyana’s greatest climb in football rankings,” added Muhammad.
Asked if the actions of the GFF boss can be deemed as a form of victimisation due to his previous role as GFA General Secretary, Muhammad said, “Honestly, I don’t think it is. Matthias is being caught between a rock and a hard place.”
“The GFF runs football in the country. They had an impasse between the GFF and the GFA and when they told us that we cannot play banned teams, we had to follow the rules and take a side, unfortunately for us, the side we took is that of the GFF,” added Muhammad.
Muhammad believes that when Webb said everything should go back to normal and no penalties meted out to the guilty individuals, their tournament should have been given a priority, since it is being played for the past 23 years, during the off-season.
Unfortunately for the K&S Organisation, that is not so, with Matthias denying he assured Muhammad hours after being elected, that their tournament would not be shifted and/or replaced by any other tournament at the specified time it is known to be played.
“We need to have this tournament played, with no parallel tournament as we are looking to have the best players from the best clubs in the country, competing, giving the fans and sponsors their monies worth,” said Muhammad.
It is now left to be seen, what response will be forthcoming from the GFF, who, according to Muhammad, has not given any to the K&S Organisation or even to the NAWF, up to the time of yesterday’s press conference.