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Jefferson George (right), interim president of the National Football Coaches of T&T (NFCTT) and its interim first vice-president Wayne Sheppard (left). PHOTO: Anthony Harris
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Jefferson George, President of the Unified Football Coaches of T&T (UFCTT) has again called for Normalisation Committee chairman, Robert Hadad to appoint the necessary standing committees of the T&T Football Association.

The TTFA constitution comprises no fewer than 16 such standing committees as follows: Emergency Committee: Finance Committee: Audit and Compliance Committee: Organising Committee for TTFA Competitions: Technical and Development Committee: Legal Committee: Committee for Women’s Football: Youth Football and Development Committee: Sports Medicine Committee: Players’ Status Committee: Marketing Committee: Club Licensing Committee: Electoral Committee: Disciplinary Committee: Ethics Committee: Appeal Committee:

However, since the appointment of the Normalisation Committee on March 17, 2020, those committees have been inactive and calls have been made by various stakeholders of the sport to have them implemented and functioning.

Recently, calls were again made by UFCTT General Secretary and former national youth goalkeeper Rayshawn Mars for the Normalisation Committee to make the much-needed appointments to the Technical Committee as it is the body that is responsible for the selection of national coaches as well as the Finance Standing Committee.

Speaking to Guardian Media Sports on Friday about the permanent appointment of Eve to the permanent post of national men’s team football coach, George, a former national youth goalkeeper said he believes the right choice was made.

George added, “We will definitely like to congratulate Angus (Eve) because we believe that he is a good choice for the job. We wish Angus and his team all the best and not just Angus, but all the other teams that are in training, the women’s team in particular.”

Reflecting on Eve’s tenure as interim boss at the Gold Cup, George added, “We think that he (Eve) did enough in his capacity as the interim coach taking us through the qualification of the Concacaf Gold Cup and representing well in the group stages.”

However, while the naming of Eve has the full backing of George, he said he was still not pleased with the process being used by Hadad.

George said, “We still find issues with the lack of process as that is something that we have always sort of objected to.

“We have recognized in the statement made by the TTFA it quoted Mr Hadad stating that Eve would have done well in his tenure as interim coach and he also expects him to work well with the youths and so on, which is a statement of fact.”

However, George said: “But, that is not the role or responsibility of the NC chairman, that is the responsibility of a Technical Committee. So it’s a little bit ironic that while Mr Hadad is making a statement or performing the function of the Technical Committee he has not appointed one, which is his responsibility within his remits. So, we continue to call on the NC to appoint all the standing committees so that they can focus on what they need to do and the committees can go about and do their function. Obviously, the NC would still have the responsibility of oversight but at this point, the way how things are being done is not how it is meant to be carried. I don’t think we are asking for too much to have things done in a way that it should be,” George ended.

This was done after Welshman James Thomas was named as the T&T senior women’s team head coach, with the rest of his technical staff being selected in Charlie Mitchell (assistant coach and performance analyst), James Baird (goalkeeper coach), Joanne Daniel (team manager), Terry Johnson-Jeremiah (equipment manager), Atiba Downes (strength and conditioning coach) and Aqilya Gomez (rehab specialist) all without having had any previous experience working in those positions and all, non-nationals as well.

Included in deciding on the national women’s team staff were T&TFA Technical Director Dion La Foucade, former T&T player Richard Chinapoo, Women’s Director of Football Jinelle James and Thomas.

On Thursday, former national captain and record appearances (118 caps) holder Angus Eve was appointed permanently to fill the position of senior national men’s coach as well as the Under-20 men’s team until March 31, 2023.

This after the 49-year-old Eve served as interim coach following his appointment in June, for the recently concluded Concacaf Gold Cup qualifiers and Group Stage matches in the USA until August 31 following an unsuccessful qualification campaign to the 2022 FIFA World Cup under then-head coach Englishman Terry Fenwick, who was appointed in December 2019.

The announcement on Eve’s appointment which came via a news release from the FIFA appointed Normalisation Committee (NC) of the T&T Football Association (TTFA).


SOURCE: T&T Guardian