Raising the bar - part II

[Don1]

Where you go wrong with your hypothesis is your overemphasis on performance in English etc leagues. While this can be ONE indicator of a player's eligibility for donning a Jamaica shirt...it is far from the only criterion nor is it even the most significant.

As they say in boxing...styles make fights.... and how a player performs in the Jamaican team is paramount.... all else is secondary

There is not and should not be any requirement for any player to as you say... have cemented a place in some English (or other foreign) team or the other before being considered by the Jamaican coach. If we support Jamaica weaning itself from the English Crutch...then perhaps we need to wean ourselves from that philosophy

[Stonigut]

No just pro league, where is a real job, is not a friend thing in who plays, it is about working hard, bonding with teammates, convincing management and coaches that you are it, you are the guy that will take this thing to the next level, win games and fight every time you get on a pitch, With a team first, cohesive brand of ball, give me the best fighters with the most heart and I bet I will get you a draw against any opposition. Yes my bias is finding your place and making it work at the club level if you can't do that you have no business playing for national team.

[Don1]

No just pro league, where is a real job, is not a friend thing in who plays, it is about working hard, bonding with teammates, convincing management and coaches that you are it, you are the guy that will take this thing to the next level, win games and fight every time you get on a pitch, With a team first, cohesive brand of ball, give me the best fighters with the most heart and I bet I will get you a draw against any opposition. Yes my bias is finding your place and making it work at the club level if you can't do that you have no business playing for national team.

So..To take your argument to its logical conclusion...there being no professional league in Jamaica... no Jamaica-based player should be considered for the national team?

Your argument is rapidly morphing from the questionable to the ludicrous

[Stonigut]

Ah I sense a teaching moment! Look the greatest societies and organization in history they get that way through many generations of building a cultural infrastructure based on achievement, goal setting and building a society based on a meritocracy where the cream rose to the top not through bloodlines but through achievement think Rome, think Greece, think Egypt even though there was a strong element of regal control throughout, at every level below there was a meritocratic structure to ensure the best came to the fore. Same here we must build a football structure based on a meritocracy, at one time we had few if any professional players now we have many, there is no doubt that all our players that are playing in pro leagues outside Jamaica are our best of the best crops over the last 15 years or so, we already have the system in place, so this is the first place we should look for our players.

Our best that got recruited to play pro ball and those that have survived the pro cauldron in the leagues in which they are placed. In the case of football the issue of leadership, initiative, communication skills and teamwork are brought to the fore, so when we see a man like Austin get player of the year award in the top league in a Scandinavian country that means something, when we see Dane Richards and Omar Cummings excel and play well and have to be included on their pro squads Everytime we know these guys are special players, you cannot put a local player in the npl ahead of any of these guys.

Thus the structure is this roughly
1. Players in the epl, Italian, Spanish, German Top leagues that is tier one These players you go to the head of the class for national duty opportunity.
2. Scandinavian leagues, mls, championship, Mexican league these are tier two
3. Npl, ELO, elo2 TNT etc are tier three

Thus a guy who fails in tier three league should not get a chance to play on a national team above a guy who is successfully playing in a tier one or two pro league.

If we don't build a clear and definitive structure so the guys understand what they must do to truly be in the picture you are building wave after wave of mediocrity which we have done at the national level even though we have had some pretty good crops of pro players over the last 15 years. Anyway this is how successful organizations are built In a methodical way where guys must know why they have to do to get into the national setup, where we don't have someone saying he should be on the national team playing npl with a goal strike rate of under 40 percent, but because the standard isn't clear then wHy not throw his hat into the ring, your approach is a continuation of mediocrity, time to build something to last a long time.

[Stonigut]

For don1

Ah I sense a teaching moment! Look the greatest societies and organization in history they get that way through many generations of building a cultural infrastructure based on achievement, goal setting and building a society based on a meritocracy where the cream rose to the top not through bloodlines but through achievement think Rome, think Greece, think Egypt even though there was a strong element of regal control throughout, at every level below there was a meritocratic structure to ensure the best came to the fore. Same here we must build a football structure based on a meritocracy, at one time we had few if any professional players now we have many, there is no doubt that all our players that are playing in pro leagues outside Jamaica are our best of the best crops over the last 15 years or so, we already have the system in place, so this is the first place we should look for our players.

Our best that got recruited to play pro ball and those that have survived the pro cauldron in the leagues in which they are placed. In the case of football the issue of leadership, initiative, communication skills and teamwork are brought to the fore, so when we see a man like Austin get player of the year award in the top league in a Scandinavian country that means something, when we see Dane Richards and Omar Cummings excel and play well and have to be included on their pro squads Everytime we know these guys are special players, you cannot put a local player in the npl ahead of any of these guys.

Thus the structure is this roughly
1. Players in the epl, Italian, Spanish, German Top leagues that is tier one These players you go to the head of the class for national duty opportunity.
2. Scandinavian leagues, mls, championship, Mexican league these are tier two
3. Npl, ELO, elo2 TNT etc are tier three

Thus a guy who fails in tier three league should not get a chance to play on a national team above a guy who is successfully playing in a tier one or two pro league.

If we don't build a clear and definitive structure so the guys understand what they must do to truly be in the picture you are building wave after wave of mediocrity which we have done at the national level even though we have had some pretty good crops of pro players over the last 15 years. Anyway this is how successful organizations are built In a methodical way where guys must know why they have to do to get into the national setup, where we don't have someone saying he should be on the national team playing npl with a goal strike rate of under 40 percent, but because the standard isn't clear then wHy not throw his hat into the ring, your approach is a continuation of mediocrity, time to build something to last a long time.

[Muadib]

juss suh long as when a Tappa reach pon di scene yuh mek sure him deh pon di field... ala one Cameroon breddah named Roger....

[Don1]

=Stonigut;356632]Ah I sense a teaching moment! Look the greatest societies and organization in history they get that way through many generations of building a cultural infrastructure based on achievement, goal setting and building a society based on a meritocracy where the cream rose to the top not through bloodlines but through achievement think Rome, think Greece, think Egypt even though there was a strong element of regal control throughout, at every level below there was a meritocratic structure to ensure the best came to the fore. Same here we must build a football structure based on a meritocracy, at one time we had few if any professional players now we have many, there is no doubt that all our players that are playing in pro leagues outside Jamaica are our best of the best crops over the last 15 years or so, we already have the system in place, so this is the first place we should look for our players.

There is no instruction here for me... my regrets to you

A meritocracy is based on PERFORMANCE...not one's station in life as your hierarchy or player grading according to club appears to signal.

So a player in some foreign club should not be automatically granted some exalted status by virtue of that position...

One cannot simultaneously preach merit and pre-determined hierarchy based on status...that renders your argument fundamentally flawed and conflicted.

That foreign player must compete and prove himself on an equal footing in the Jamaican environment along with all others including local players.

Also... Jamaica absolutely DOES NOT have an adequate system of player development in place as you appear to state...quite the opposite in fact.

Our best that got recruited to play pro ball and those that have survived the pro cauldron in the leagues in which they are placed. In the case of football the issue of leadership, initiative, communication skills and teamwork are brought to the fore, so when we see a man like Austin get player of the year award in the top league in a Scandinavian country that means something, when we see Dane Richards and Omar Cummings excel and play well and have to be included on their pro squads Everytime we know these guys are special players, you cannot put a local player in the npl ahead of any of these guys.

A specious argument...seductive but fatally flawed determinism.

Austin is a good case in point...Player of the Year in a foreign club... but his performances for Jamaica? ...Underwhelming to say the least.

Thus the structure is this roughly
1. Players in the epl, Italian, Spanish, German Top leagues that is tier one These players you go to the head of the class for national duty opportunity.
2. Scandinavian leagues, mls, championship, Mexican league these are tier two
3. Npl, ELO, elo2 TNT etc are tier three

Thus a guy who fails in tier three league should not get a chance to play on a national team above a guy who is successfully playing in a tier one or two pro league.

If we don't build a clear and definitive structure so the guys understand what they must do to truly be in the picture you are building wave after wave of mediocrity which we have done at the national level even though we have had some pretty good crops of pro players over the last 15 years. Anyway this is how successful organizations are built In a methodical way where guys must know why they have to do to get into the national setup, where we don't have someone saying he should be on the national team playing npl with a goal strike rate of under 40 percent, but because the standard isn't clear then wHy not throw his hat into the ring, your approach is a continuation of mediocrity, time to build something to last a long time.

Profoundly misguided.

The structure which should be built must NOT be based on a specious hierarchy based on station... it must be performance based on a level playing field.... aka Meritocracy

Where Jamaica has faltered badly is not in (foreign) player selection...but in the grass roots development of players in an organized system of high level coaching and exposure to quality play.

Out of such a system will organically spring a steadier stream of players attractive to foreigners...and ultimately a larger pool of professionals who can compete for national places with those still at home.

It's not rocket science... just logic

[Stonigut]

Brethren you are killing me with flawed logic. Ok here is something we agree upon

"Jamaica has faltered badly in the grass roots development of players in an organized system of high level coaching and exposure to quality play" your words. Well that is exactly what I have said over and over, the difference is what is the next step, What is long term solution, it is to develop such system piece by piece with a long term 20 year development plan to start the ball rolling.

In the mean time you cyan wait for that to bear fruit, you have a few options, we have developed about 50 plus players in last 15 years playing at various pro clubs different divisions all over, we also have players of Jakan origin that play in top notch leagues and are good decent players, well all we are saying is the short cut for now is to pick the most seasoned, tested players in the best leagues. Pick based on performance and you have a seasoned well tested core to compete as best as you are able.


Based on your argument you would take an untested gladiator from a backwater part of libya and put him in the ring in Rome. That argument is not even worth having. You pick your best warriors who have mastered a superior environment not ones who have merely emerged at the top of the rubble in the local arena with substandard performance, surely you cannot be against such straightforward common sense logic.

[Don1]

Stonigut;356855]Brethren you are killing me with flawed logic. Ok here is something we agree upon

No. I have pointed out the fatal flaw that makes your argument irredeemable. Meritocracy based on demonstrated performance in the only environment that matters ie the Jamaican environment and a pre-determined hierarchy based on status are incompatible constructs.

Your argument cannot recover from this conflict and is lost...sorry

"Jamaica has faltered badly in the grass roots development of players in an organized system of high level coaching and exposure to quality play" your words. Well that is exactly what I have said over and over, the difference is what is the next step, What is long term solution, it is to develop such system piece by piece with a long term 20 year development plan to start the ball rolling.

Good that you see the sense of this

In the mean time you cyan wait for that to bear fruit, you have a few options, we have developed about 50 plus players in last 15 years playing at various pro clubs different divisions all over, we also have players of Jakan origin that play in top notch leagues and are good decent players, well all we are saying is the short cut for now is to pick the most seasoned, tested players in the best leagues. Pick based on performance and you have a seasoned well tested core to compete as best as you are able.

The only thing relevant here is

Pick based on performance

Exactly what I'm saying. Performance and not some irrelevant ranking by type of club

Based on your argument you would take an untested gladiator from a backwater part of libya and put him in the ring in Rome. That argument is not even worth having. You pick your best warriors who have mastered a superior environment not ones who have merely emerged at the top of the rubble in the local arena with substandard performance, surely you cannot be against such straightforward common sense logic.

What I'm against is the ridiculous ranking system by club that you promote.

Any coach offering such a rationale for choosing players in the Jamaican environment ...or any environment for that matter ...would need his head examined.

The only ranking that matters is that emerging out of specific performance levels for Jamaica in our particular & peculiar regional environment... the club an individual plays for is an interesting artifact...but not of much relevance a priori.
It may well be that the best choices emerging from a merit based performance process are mostly attached to foreign clubs...but to propose a player ranking before an actual test on the field of play is ludicrous as there will always be cases or the possibility of cases where locals are more suitable than foreigners. Note that locals do not have to be "superior players" in general to be a "better fit" considering Jamaica's particular football environment.

Here the lesson endeth

Selah

[Stonigut]

I love your logic, this is exactly the reason why we cannot move forward, burying our head in the sand of local environment. If we did what you said and only chose based on what was done locally we would not even be having this discussion. You have closed your mind to the only option that offers the short term solution to Jamaica being competitive on the world stage.

What the clubs outside of Jamaica offer is an environment in which the best players can test themselves against the best other countries have to offer and clearly only our best make it to these clubs. Thus the competitive cauldron based on meritocracy has been created and those that survive its fire are the ones who best represent us. Truth is I cannot think of one country that actually has developed even a halfway decent side to come close to making a world cup that uses the system you propose, it is burying your head in the sand while others race past you at breakneck speed.i can already tell you that making it to rio will not be easy, guat in this round is a different team that we have been beating consistently, even with our new stellar recruits it will be a test.

Cr, panama, el sal, mex, can,USA alll teams that can beat us on any day, we need the best players we can get to make it to the top three in the hex, those players that play for professional clubs outside Jamaica have already earned a place beyond our local players by the mere fact that they have been chosen to play in a pro system and if they survive that environment and are contributing that is exactly what we are after.

When one of our players fail on the field iN any pro league it is symbolic of a failure somewhere in our system that does not create the proper foundation mentally, physically to be competitive in a new environment where everyone else is as skilled as you or their combination of assets is so much that it overwhelms what you have, at the very least our best must be able to compete outside of ja in any club environment especially 2nd tier pro clubs mls, championship and below and when one of our promising players that everyone like you think is so great, when they fail there is no place for review, no place for how did we fail, what did we miss, nothing but excuses which leads to more failures. Well maybe is true him never bring him favorite boots or just true is pure kick and run him cant fit in,or it did too cold or the man them just never like him, failure is the opportunity to improve and when we get our best players outside ja is when we see what our weaknesses are, without that test outside of the local arena we are going nowhere, suh it go. Look around you f you cannot compete outside your own backyard you may as well hang it up, everything we are doing in Jamaica should be aimed at competing at the top level outside of Jamaica for our most promising, no other way to do it.

I personally want more than that, I want to get the best possible side out there and continue to build a performance driven system based on stages of performance achievement at every level of football, local, 3rd tier, 2nd tier and 1st tier without it there is no improvement just mucking around in constant mediocrity as we have been doing since 1998. Good discussion but I can only help you so much.

[Muadib]

Sorry to cut in.. but.. would Tappa make your side ?

or would he be penalized for only reaching as far as D4 in hingland.. suh if you find a UB40 midfielder playing in the Championship (D2) him automatically get select over Tappa... ??

[Don1]

Just briefly scanned this tiresome epistle...but I gather you're still Drinking From Babylon's Poisoned Chalice...or you completely misunderstand my point.

1. A player's status should not assure favoritism in selection...only performance in the Jamaican jersey

2. The short term solution we have leaned on i.e. getting foreigners to play for us en masse is a losing strategy which allows us to indefinitely delay the heavy lifting of quality player development at home

In fact what is called short term is a misnomer... we're in the 16th year of that "short term strategy" of English journeyman importation... and still with no credible player development system on the horizon

Your understandable but misguided views would merely codify the folly and prolong the agony

[Don1]

Sorry to cut in.. but.. would Tappa make your side ?

or would he be penalized for only reaching as far as D4 in hingland.. suh if you find a UB40 midfielder playing in the Championship (D2) him automatically get select over Tappa... ??

Therein lies the folly of his profoundly conflicted argument

[Karl]

Just briefly scanned this tiresome epistle...but I gather you're still Drinking From Babylon's Poisoned Chalice...or you completely misunderstand my point.

1. A player's status should not assure favoritism in selection...only performance in the Jamaican jersey

So which comes first - selection or being in the Jamaica Jersey?

2. The short term solution we have leaned on i.e. getting foreigners to play for us en masse is a losing strategy which allows us to indefinitely delay the heavy lifting of quality player development at home

What exactly has 'using foreign players en masse' to do with creating and implementing of quality player development at home ?

In fact what is called short term is a misnomer... we're in the 16th year of that "short term strategy" of English journeyman importation... and still after more than a century of ball with no credible player development system on the horizon

Agreed!

Your understandable but misguided views would merely codify the folly and prolong the agony

...and that is as a result of not understanding exactly what you are accusing Stonigut of...

Are you saying he is misguided to suggest using our best based on a selection process that rates possible squad members as per his suggested system of 'ratings'?

...or...that the recruitment of 'foreigners' will surely lead to continued absence of a viable local development program?

...or...

[Stonigut]

I think we may be pretty close to the same place but as with every yard team I have ever played with we are champions at arguing over minute distinctions.

I am definitely not pushing short term over long term homegrown development but I am a realist and the truth is we have a long was to go on developing a real strong domestic program that will result in a consistently strong national team at alll levels.

Thus due to that inadequacy we must resort to the short term strategy which as you said seems to be the long term strategy since mid nineties. All I would like to see is a systematic way of calling up players based on performance, so if Tuffy Anderson scored say twenty plus goals out of 35 matches in the Npl with a few assists and truly shows the hunger to want to improve his game he should get a shot at say a Jamaica vs Guyana game, just want to see more structure in the selection process so the man them understand what must be done to get a call up. When I see players like Henry, Ronaldo, eto'o, van persie having seasons where they can score close to a goal per game not to mention assists on top of that at the very highest levels of ball and not one of our guys can come close to that kind of production at any level it says to me that we have a long way to go on the domestic front to producing true world quality ballers.


Now when guys get called for national duty retaining them on the national squad is always based on the performance at that level. The club creds only come into play to get them into the door of trying out and getting a chance to express their desire at the national level. That is it pretty simple stuff.