Football officials have been unable to confirm reports that Birmingham City football star Dwight Yorke will be coming out of retirement from international duty to suit up for Trinidad and Tobagos CONCACAF World Cup qualifying final round campaign.
Shaun Fuentes, the Trinidad and Tobago Football Federation press
officer, told CMC Sports that the TTFF had received no official word of
Yorke's availability for the Soca Warriors' opening fixture against
the United States on February 9.
'From our standpoint at the Trinidad and Tobago Football Federation, we have had no word from Dwight stating that he's willing to come back,' Fuentes said yesterday.
'We know that there has been some talk going on in the past'. obviously coach Bertille St Clair has always been trying to see if he could get Dwight to come back into the fray, but theres nothing that we can confirm at the moment.'
National coach St Clair has made no secret of his desire to have the 33-year-old Yorke back in the T&T squad. His latest call for Yorke to rejoin the squad came after Trinidad and Tobago qualified for the final round of the World Cup qualification tournament last December.
The volatile Yorke quit international football back in 2001, under then coach Brazilian Rene Simoes.
Fuentes said there had been reports that Yorke had been in contact with Orville London, chairman of the Tobago House of Assembly, indicating that he would be interested in coming back to rejoin the national team.
'There is also talk that Graham Taylor, who started working with the team, has been in talks with Dwight to see if he can get him to change his mind and be available for the game on February 9,' Fuentes said.
He added: 'But at this time all we can say is that the list of overseas players that we have in the squad to face the Americans does not include Dwight Yorke and it is left to be seen if anything will transpire over the next few days.'