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Thu, Mar

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…Thinks Latapy may be removed as coach

Former national footballer Brent Sancho is not expecting Russell Latapy to remain at the helm of national football, given the recent poor fortunes of the national team.

The "Little Magician" has been under fire since he assumed the post of senior Trinidad and Tobago in March with a two-year contract. A string of disappointing results and a Digicel Caribbean Cup campaign failure later, Latapy's job appears to be hanging in the balance.

Sancho thinks it is unlikely Latapy will be allowed to continue in the job, following a T&T Football Federation post mortem of T&T's DCC showing.

"For the near future, I can't see Russell staying on… it's not the appropriate situation for him to be coaching in," Sancho said.

The North East Stars FC CEO further explained the reasoning behind his statement.

"You have to take a look at the whole scope of things, you look at the fact that (Latapy has) come in at the lowest point of Trinidad football, and he's not the most experienced coach. It's like sending a new carpenter to build a house. It's no big surprise that that has happened."

Sancho, who with Latapy represented T&T at the 2006 Word Cup, is not quick to say Latapy should be removed. He did say, however, that all the decision-making stakeholders need to come together and craft a long-term strategy to get T&T back to the place of prominence in the region that they enjoyed just four years ago.

"This is not a one-man solution," Sancho said. "It doesn't work like that. Put T&T first before you do anything else. There's no quick fix."

The dreadlocked former T&T defender blamed the player blacklist of 2006, of which he was a part, for the downslide in national football. Sancho and 15 other players, including Kenwyne Jones and Kelvin Jack are still fighting their legal battle with the T&TFF over bonuses owed to the players.

"This whole thing, it is a direct effect of the blacklisting and what has transpired from 2006 and up to now, we can't come out of the group stage in two Caribbean Cups. That's unacceptable."

Sancho feels that despite their results, this current T&T squad is full of talent, and just need time to develop. He stated that fresh ideas are required, and suggested this country might benefit by some of the seasoned decision-makers stepping aside and allowing more energetic people to try to take T&T football forward.

"All these pseudo posts they hold in the Federation, they need to realise they haven't done well," Sancho said. "They need to step aside and allow people with merit and qualification to take over."