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JAAA's error
Tuesday, April 14, 2009
We were heartened by the efforts of the Inter-Secondary Schools Sports Association (ISSA) to ensure that this year's staging of the GraceKennedy-sponsored Boys' and Girls' Athletics Championships exhibited the high ideals of sportsmanship and discipline.
In fact, but for a few incidents, particularly on the final day, Champs was a fairly good event, even amidst the potentially explosive atmosphere of intense rivalry between eventual winners Kingston College and second-placed Calabar High School.
One glaring blemish on the championship and the image of Calabar, however, was young Mr Ricardo Powell who, while anchoring his school's 4x100 team to the gold medal in the final, raised his right middle finger to a section of the spectators in what is a well-known offensive gesture.
If, at the time he did it, Mr Powell's gesture was not seen by the athletics authorities, it was captured and published by this newspaper for all to see. We, therefore, think it was a slap in ISSA's face that Mr Powell was not dropped from Jamaica's team to the Carifta Games.
The Jamaica Amateur Athletics Association (JAAA) has a duty to set standards of behaviour for those in their charge who represent this country. In this instance, they failed to send a strong message to Mr Powell and anyone else who would be like-minded, that unsportsmanlike behaviour will not be tolerated.
Tuesday, April 14, 2009
We were heartened by the efforts of the Inter-Secondary Schools Sports Association (ISSA) to ensure that this year's staging of the GraceKennedy-sponsored Boys' and Girls' Athletics Championships exhibited the high ideals of sportsmanship and discipline.
In fact, but for a few incidents, particularly on the final day, Champs was a fairly good event, even amidst the potentially explosive atmosphere of intense rivalry between eventual winners Kingston College and second-placed Calabar High School.
One glaring blemish on the championship and the image of Calabar, however, was young Mr Ricardo Powell who, while anchoring his school's 4x100 team to the gold medal in the final, raised his right middle finger to a section of the spectators in what is a well-known offensive gesture.
If, at the time he did it, Mr Powell's gesture was not seen by the athletics authorities, it was captured and published by this newspaper for all to see. We, therefore, think it was a slap in ISSA's face that Mr Powell was not dropped from Jamaica's team to the Carifta Games.
The Jamaica Amateur Athletics Association (JAAA) has a duty to set standards of behaviour for those in their charge who represent this country. In this instance, they failed to send a strong message to Mr Powell and anyone else who would be like-minded, that unsportsmanlike behaviour will not be tolerated.
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