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T&T Training'Warriors' to play Romania, Estonia in June.

The Trinidad and Tobago Football Federation today regrettably advises that the Friendly International between this country’s Senior Men’s Team and Belize scheduled for Friday March 22nd at the Ato Boldon Stadium in Couva will now be played in Belize City on March 23rd.

This has come about following discussions between officials of the T&T Football Federation (TTFF) and the Belize FF in Chicago on Wednesday. It has been communicated that the reason for the change in venue has resulted due to logistical challenges associated with travel arrangements for the Belize team.

TTFF President Raymond Tim Kee immediately expressed his disappointment over the inability of the game to be staged on T&T soil but agreed to have the T&T team fly to Belize City to play a day later. There was no other available opponent of worth available to travel to T&T to play around the same date. Following the game in Belize City, the T&T squad will travel to Lima to face Peru on March 26th.

Tim Kee was in Chicago along with Senior team co-head coach Hutson Charles and team manager William Wallace on Wednesday where officials of the twelve nations at the CONCACAf Gold Cup held meetings and a workshop was staged in relation to the tournament.

The TTFF President expressed his satisfaction with T&T’s grouping which includes matches against Haiti, El Salvador and Honduras in July.

He also took the opportunity to reveal that inspite of the disappointment of the initially scheduled game against Belize being shifted, there was another pair of friendly internationals approaching that would be beneficial to T&T’s preparation for the Gold Cup. T&T will travel to Bucharest to face Romania’s Senior Team in a friendly international on June 4th and also Estonia in that country on June 7th.

Romania are currently in 31st spot on the FIFA rankings and are captained by Shakhtar Donetsk defender Razvan Rat. They defeated Turkey 1-0 in a 2014 World Cup qualifier last October before going under 4-1 to Holland.

They defeated Australia 3-2 in a friendly last month and also got the better of Belgium 2-1 last November. Estonia meantime are ranked 82nd but achieved their best ever position on the rankings, 47th last March. They lost 1-0 to Scotland in a friendly last month and their last victory was a 2-1 win over Oman last  November. They also beat Poland 1-0 last August.

“Let me say that we at the Trinidad and Tobago Football Federation feel a sense of disappointment over the fact that next Friday’s match against Belize will no longer be played on home soil and this came about because of circumstances that were beyond our control,” Tim Kee told TTFF Media.

“But in saying that we felt it was necessary to ensure that the opportunity was still there for our men’s senior team to be able to play an international game because we could not afford to miss out on an international FIFA date. This is of course all part of the program for our team’s build up to the Gold Cup and we wanted to ensure that this would not be a setback to the team’s preparations.

“On another note I must say that we felt very encouraged by the results of the draw for the Gold Cup. It is by no means an easy group but it is one that I feel quietly optimistic about regarding our chances of advancing to the quarter-final stage,” Tim Kee added.

“We are continuing our efforts to ensure that our national teams are afford every opportunity to prepare adequately for the international stage and that our development programmes are properly streamlined with the right support and resources.

The Under 17 team will continue their preparations with another upcoming training camp before heading to Panama City for the Under 17 World Cup qualifiers. And for the first time  since 2006, our senior men’s team will play in Europe against two European countries as Romania and Estonia have agreed to host us.

Despite our challenges, we are trying to ensure that the business of football relating to the country’s representation in the international arena moves ahead with some degree of progress,” Tim Kee continued.

The T&T Senior team will resume training at the Ato Boldon Stadium on Monday with the inclusion of some of the overseas-based players for the Belize and Peru matches.