Golden Jaguars 1st session at stadium hailed by Shabazz

Jun 20, 2008 Sports

By Franklin Wilson
Technical Director of the Guyana Football Federation Jamaal Shabazz is of the view that the Government of Guyana has made an important statement by allowing the uses of the National Stadium at Providence for the return World Cup fixture against Suriname on Sunday.

These sentiments were offered following the Jaguars’ first practice session at the venue on Thursday (yesterday) morning. Shabazz who is normally a very fluent speaker was fumbling for words when approached by this reporter to offer a comment on the historic moment.

“Today I feel very, very proud if I dare say to be Guyanese. The players expressed a different feeling of nationalism by just being able to have that training session and I think that this is a big move by the government to allow this game to be played here and the teams to have these training sessions here.

This is the start of something very special, a feeling and a sense of nationalism that would be very real.”
Shabazz was also upbeat that the excellent quality of the ground would lend to some exciting football.

“The ground would suit the style of play of the two teams because they like to keep the ball and we like to keep it too, but it more suits the guys who’ve played in Trinidad on pitches like these so we are very happy with the pitch.

We think that makes for a tremendous showdown and who miss this game miss another part of history in Guyana.”