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Friday, October 25, 2002
A few days after the recent Japan vs. Jamaica match, Karl Wallace and I sat with Technical Director, Carl Brown, for a discussion on football. An affable individual, Carl is also passionate about football and got going from the very first whistle.
KW: Technical Director Brown, let me thank you for taking time out to sit with RBSC and allowing Mosiah and myself this interview. Many members of the football fraternity and indeed all Jamaica have been waiting to hear from you. Many are the cracks being taken at the appointment of a local TD. What would be your response to those who question the JFF’s wisdom in selecting you as the TD to lead our football?
CB: I am just wondering, the people who are saying that it won’t work without an international coach, if they are cognizant of the need, the financial need that will bring the success they are talking about, the financial need that brought the 98 success that we had? It wasn’t just about a foreigner coming here. It was about a financial support that allowed him to implement the ideas that he had. For years, if you trace our history, you would have seen that some of the things he did were really not new ideas, but he was able to implement them because of the financial support that he got. And, you know, we keep hearing about local as opposed to foreign coaches, in terms of information, in today’s world the Internet affords you all the information you need regardless of what you may be about. It is not new. It is not like in the sixties when you have to go to Brazil, or England or the States to get information. Information is available now. And we need some people to understand that. We as local coaches are asking also, and maybe like how some of the powers that be are demanding an opportunity and a chance to really show whether we can do it or not.
We are talking about giving us the necessary support;
1) the necessary financial support,
2) infrastructure,
3) material support, and
4) spiritual support.
That is what we are asking for. George Thompson was never given it, Leighton Duncan was never given it, Jackie Bell was never given it, and we can say, for all the local coaches that have gone through we can find one thing in common, that they were never given the sort of financial support that we see foreign coaches have gotten over the years.
Listen to what is happening. Right now we are not even able to play any game in the National Stadium. The federation (JFF) probably has lost Ja$25M this year. Teams like Costa Rica we were able to play there, Senegal, Norway. I mean these are big games for the federation. These are the sorts of things we are talking about and we need that sort of support.
If we trace the history and you go back to (Jorge) Penna in the sixties when he came here, if you look at Otmar Calder in the seventies and we see it with Rene Simoes and Clovis de Oliveira when they came here, the big difference between what foreigners have been given as opposed to what we as local coaches get.
We hear the cry of those out there of people who don't believe. We want to convert them. We are not talking to the converted. We want to see the ones who don't understand or don't believe that we truly can do it.
KW: You have just taken over the national program. What time frame do you think we should look at in terms of seeing positive results? Jamaicans, we are a very impatient people and we are looking for instant success. Sometimes that is not realistic.
CB: I am not certain that a timeframe is what I would want to be put under. Firstly, I think we should look at a four-year period, and we are talking about one World Cup to the next, because regardless of what we do on the field everybody will judge whether we fail or succeed at the end of the day if we are in Germany in 2006 or not. And I feel that that's the sort of freehand that we need.
That freehand was given to Rene when he came here, that is what we wanted. 1998 was the important thing. In 1995 when we lost to the USA 3-0, we didn't send him home. We saw it as a learning curve. When we got 6-0 in Mexico, we didn't kill him, it was a learning curve and I am saying that the local coaches must be afforded these sorts of level playing fields.
I am saying that 2006 is where we need to be so whatever happens in between here and 2006 that is how we are going to be judged at the end of the day. We should be allowed that privilege and that freedom to plan whatever we are doing to ensure that in 2006 we are given the best opportunity to exceed.
Interviewer(s): Mosiah Marshall & Karl Wallace
Editor's note:
Part 2 of this interview will follow on Sunday, November 17th.
Interview with national Under-20 coach, Windell Downswell, will be available on Thursday, November 14th.