GUYANA’S Senior National football team, popularly known as the ‘Golden Jaguars’, were given a boost with the inclusion of English duo, Matthew Briggs and Neil Danns, ahead of their International Friendly against Grenada to be played this Sunday at the Guyana National Stadium. 

Briggs, 24, in 2007 at just 16 years 65 days old, became the youngest player to feature in the Barclays Premier League when he played with Fulham FC against Middlesbrough FC and now plays with Championship side Midwall FC, but is on loan to Colchester FC.
A member of Bolton Wanderers Football Club, Danns, 32, played for several top teams in the English Championship – Leicester City, Crystal Palace, Birmingham City and Leicester City – just to name a few, before signing permanently with ‘the Whites’ last year.
Eligible to play for the ‘Golden Jaguars’ through their grandparents, both Danns and Briggs believe that their arrival sparks the dawn of a new era for Guyana’s football, since it would encourage others like themselves in England, to voyage to the South American country and help build a super team to compete in CONCACAF and further afield.
Speaking at a Press Conference hosted yesterday at the Guyana Football Federation (GFF) head office, the players shared their reasons for wanting to represent Guyana.
Danns stated, “This is my first time in Guyana and when the opportunity came to play for the National team, I was excited not just for the football side but to also come and get to educate myself about my family’s heritage and right away, I can see the distinct culture of my family over here.”
“I just want to play International football,” Briggs said. “Growing up around Guyanese people is all I’ve known and I’ve never been here so the first opportunity I got to come I snatched it. I lost my grandmother eight years ago and when I hear the grown women speak, it reminded me of her, so it’s just these little things that made me come here.”
But Briggs told reporters that a few years ago, he got a similar offer but “at the time I was around the England youth set up and back then I was a bit young and not as mature as I am now, but after I played for the Under-21s I thought to myself that, I’m Guyanese and now I have a chance to make a contribution and to play for my country”.
The tall, well-built defender has played in England’s youth system starting from their U-16, straight through to their U-21 team.
Asked what difference he will add to the Golden Jaguars, Danns, a midfield player, noted that he brings with him, “the experience of playing at a high level in England and not just on the pitch, but off the pitch as well. There are standards that you need to live up to, like how you live, how you diet and how you rest and train, and I feel with our experience we can show the local lads, especially those who never had the opportunity to work with professional players that we have worked with; we can pass on that knowledge”.
Head coach of the Golden Jaguars, Jamaal Shabazz, said that at present, it’s an “interesting time not just for Guyana’s football but for Caribbean football.
“Because as Marcus Garvey would say ‘as a tree without root is dead, so too is a people without knowledge of their past and history and culture’.”
“For these guys to do what (Chris) Nurse and Carl Cort and Leon Cort before them (have done), it’s saying something very profound, that they are very conscious not just of football, but of the need to connect with their roots and it is with that connection, we’ll see football develop and the young people of the Caribbean being able to benefit”.
Shabazz added, “I’ve officially banned the terms foreign and local; it’s only Guyanese, because this is the Guyana National Team and (by the way), this is not a paid political announcement. I want to thank the guys for coming and together we will live this dream.”
The players said that in England there are many quality players, even in the Premier League who would love to represent Guyana but (are) hesitant, based on expectations, but with them now being part of the system locally, they will use their experience to encourage them to come and be part of the programme and help Guyana to progress to the World Cup finals.

By Rawle Toney