GFF has no hope – Mendonca

Aug 06, 2008 Sports

By Edison Jefford
The Georgetown Football Association’s (GFA) searing temperature over the management of local football during the past 20 years was enough to shatter the already waning Guyana Football Federation’s (GFF) administration yesterday.

GFA’s President, Troy Mendonca told Kaieteur Sport in an interview yesterday that his desire is not to get involve in any fight for position, but rather, he is more concerned about the future of football in Guyana.

Mendonca made it categorically clear that the GFF under the leadership and stewardship of its current President, Colin Klass, has no hope. He outlined several reasons why he has arrived at that pessimistic view.

“This man [Klass] has failed to develop the sport. There are people who are making real efforts to develop the sport at the grassroots level but there is no hope at the federation level,” Mendonca said.

According to the GFA boss, the federation’s attitude toward football was compounded by the recent developments surrounding, not only Guyana’s senior national players, but also the organising of the Digicel Caribbean Cup.

“No hotels were booked for teams etc…and yesterday afternoon was the first time that the selected players [for the Digicel Cup, which begins today] came together for an international match,” Mendonca lamented.

To make matters worse, he said that the GFF President was no where around. It was reported that Klass arrived in Guyana only on Sunday after witnessing the Beach Soccer World Cup in France.

“Our position is not about attacking anyone’s character but the efforts that other people make in terms of getting the game played will fall by the wayside because of this current [GFF] incompetence,” he observed.

Mendonca mentioned the Gold Project and a fiasco involving Tagman Services as other areas of concern for the GFA.

While some countries are now in their second and third phases of the Gold Project with FIFA disbursements made between 2002–2004 and 2006–2008 for the first and second phases, Guyana’s Project is still to get off the ground.

Tagman Services was contracted during Guyana’s World Cup qualification match against Suriname. Mendonca said that 7000 thousand tickets were under the company’s purview but less than quarter of the revenue was accounted for.

“The 7000 thousand tickets that they had to sell would have amounted to $10.5M but he [Tagman] only accounted for $2M and said that he has no more money to give. How can we allow someone to just rip off the sport?” Mendonca questioned.

The money is arguably the biggest gate income ever in local football. The deal between Tagman and the GFF is unknown but according to reports, Klass is yet to give an adequate account of the gate receipts for the tickets.

In addition, the GFA president spoke about the lack of scholarships for local players over the past 15 years and the poor state of facilities. He said that it would only take around $2M out of FIFA’s annual $50M subvention to upkeep venues.

“It’s now over 20 years and he has not presided well over football. Our stance is not about competing for position but about a new Executive to take football forward,” Mendonca informed. He insisted that the GFA will not pursue any political course.

Discover more from Kaieteur News

Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.

Latest News