… Baptiste chides indisciplined teams

THE winners of the recently concluded Guinness Greatest of the Streets Football Challenge were yesterday morning presented with their monetary prizes and trophies at a simple ceremony.
Held at the Banks DIH Sports Club at Thirst Park, winners Sparta Boss collected their $500 000 and trophy after they beat Tucville, who pocketed $200 000 and a trophy.
Third- and fourth-place winners Back Circle and Broad Street also picked up their earnings of $150 000 and $75 000 respectively after Friday’s presentation ceremony that preceded the game that was washed out by rain.

Speaking yesterday, Guinness Brand Manager Lee Baptiste scolded those teams who showed indiscipline, adding that those behaviours will be met with the harsh penalties in the coming legs.
“For the first time we had a main sponsor for the uniforms and I had to be going every night to ensure that the teams wore their uniforms. A whole team came out without their uniforms and we had to stop the whole night’s proceedings for them to go and get their uniforms. That’s not going to happen anymore,” Baptiste said.
He continued, “From the next sub-meet, you come on the court without your uniform, socks, trunks T-shirt, (if) it’s one player, (he/she) cannot play; the whole team (without uniform), the whole team cannot play; immediate walkover. It’s got to stop.”

He, however, lauded the various winners, reminding that they are not only brand ambassadors for their community but now, their region adding that on-field play has improved drastically.
“The officials were just telling me that we had only one yellow card for the entire tournament which was a high improvement from the previous one.”
Also in attendance yesterday was Director of Sport Christopher Jones who said that government is taking note of the work that Guinness is doing in the communities and will do its bit to support that initiative.

“We at the National Sports Commission are continuing to have discussions with the Ministry of Finance. We want to see that the ministry can provide to companies/corporate Guyana, who would lend support to the development of sports,” he added.
He continued, ‘Tax breaks, tax exemptions; tax holidays and so forth,” are what the Sport Director indicated are the recommendations on the table by the NSC, adding that he is hopeful in 2017 those discussions can be realised.
Meanwhile, Colours representatives indicated that they were pleased to be on board for a second year running and were pleased at the support that they have seen.
The top four teams will move onto the regional front with the next leg set for late January.