By Rawle Toney

THE Confederation of North, Central American and Caribbean Association Football (CONCACAF), announced on Tuesday, that their Qualifiers for the FIFA World Cup Qatar 2022 will not be played in the FIFA match windows of October or November 2020, and will instead begin with the first round in the FIFA match window of March 2021.

In a release, the Confederation said the decision came following recent discussions with its member associations, FIFA and other stakeholders as they continue to plan for the resumption of its competitions across the region.

The reason, CONCACAF stated, is because many parts of the region continue to have very challenging public health situations.

Additionally, several countries across the Confederation have travel restrictions and quarantine requirements, which would make international football involving 30 national teams extremely difficult.

Guyana’s Golden Jaguars were drawn in Group F alongside Trinidad and Tobago, St Kitts and Nevis, Puerto Rico and The Bahamas.

With just one month to go before Guyana kickoff their 2022 Qatar World Cup qualifiers against Trinidad and Tobago, president of the Guyana Football Federation (GFF), Wayne Forde, said he’s worried, that the current guidelines set by the country’s National COVID-19 Task Force, will be a bugbear for the country’s preparation plans.

“Absolutely nothing is taking place because nothing can take place until such time that we have the approval and the guidance and protocols from the Ministry of Health and the COVID-19 Task Force,” Forde said during an appearance on NCN’s Guyana Today TV show on Friday.

The Golden Jaguars were drawn in Group F in the CONCACAF zone of the 2022 Qatar World Cup Qualifier, alongside Trinidad and Tobago, St Kitts and Nevis, Puerto Rico and The Bahamas.

According to CONCACAF’s schedule for their leg of the 2022 Qatar World Cup qualifiers, the Golden Jaguars are set to travel to Trinidad and Tobago on October 8, where they will kick-off their campaign against the Soca Warriors.

Following their game in the Twin Island Republic Guyana will return home to play the Bahamas on Tuesday, October 13.

On November 13, Guyana will travel to St Kitts and Nevis for their third game and then host Puerto Rico on November 17.

Only recently, in a Chronicle Sport article, president of the Guyana Football Federation, Wayne Forde, said was worried that the current guidelines set by the country’s National COVID-19 Task Force, would’ve been a bugbear for the country’s preparation plans.

GFF president had reasoned that while football in some parts of the world has returned under strict protocols by FIFA and the respective health officials, locally, it’s a contrasting story.

However, while most of the Jaguars’ overseas-based players have returned to action in their respective leagues, locally, football has been at a stand-still since the pandemic in March, or, as the case of the GFF Elite League, since March of 2019.

Forde noted that both the game’s global body, FIFA and the confederation of CONCACAF, are closely monitoring the situation for the participating countries, while revealing the GFF has been providing “constant update to them, so I’m sure in a matter of days we’ll be formally notified by the decisions of FIFA and CONCACAF that will help to mitigate what we anticipate a real problem, if we’re unable to prepare properly.”

Guyana’s best performance at a FIFA World Cup qualifier tournament came in the run-up to the 2014 edition, where the Golden Jaguars had reached the penultimate round of the CONCACAF Zone.