Wow. It seems like I just keep repeating myself

[Jangle]

I wrote this in 2008. So things change, so they remain the same. Aaaww bwoy!!!!

Time to Face Reality

Ok, so we lost our game to Honduras. Where do we go from here? I will not waste time trying to analyze the game because I did not see it and also, because of the result, it would be a waste of the few brain cells I have left. I would however, like to examine the root cause of what appears to be our imminent failure to qualify for the 2010 World Cup and how do we move forward.

Let us start with our first problem, TIME. However we as fans choose to spin it, our Boyz just did not have enough time to properly prepare for this round of qualification. Regardless of the fact that our current crop of players are more technically and professionally advanced in comparison to those from the ’98 campaign, they needed to have been playing together for the past two years prior to this campaign. If we look at our opponents who are performing much better than us you will see my point. This we can lay squarely on the shoulders of our administrators, both Burrell and more so Boxhill who have to take the lion share of the blame. Throughout the prior two years of beginning a WCQ stage, the coach needs to be observing, cutting and adding players to his core team whilst imparting his philosophy. I would go even further to state that in Jamaica’s case, that preparation period should have really started right after we returned from France in 1998. We made those finals through the Grace of God, Prayers, Luck and a very benevolent Mexico who sent a young inexperienced team to Jamaica after they secured their WC berth. Prior to 1998 and even to this date, Jamaica does not have a proper football structure in place.

This brings me to our other problem, Football Culture. Jamaica does not have a football culture. We like to watch it….. on TV, but we won’t go out of our way to go to a match. Until we reach the point where a NPL club can consistently attract fans to fill even 70% of their stadium to support the team even if they are at the bottom of the table, we cannot say that we love football and have a football culture. We see that level of support when we watch any South American, Central American or European club league. THEY have a football culture. I just read about the Hamburg FC in Germany allocating a section of their grounds as burial spots for their fans. Boca Juniors in Argentina was also named as another club to do so. How many local fans do you know would be so committed to any Jamaican club?

We have 2.7 million “expert” coaches, but not one (that I know of) internationally accredited coach. Let me clarify my statement before the attacks start. We have a few local coaches who have gone on to do a few FIFA certified courses, but we do not have a single coach who has excelled at the international or local level that sets him apart from his peers. My conception of a successful local coach is one who has spent a number of years as an understudy or as the head coach of an international club in a respectable professional league, or one who has dominated the local scene as head coach of a club in the NPL. The closest local coach that fits those criteria is Carl Brown. However, this is not a call for his return because I am of the opinion that Jamaica does need a foreign coach with the international credentials.

So we move on to Rene Simoes. I can understand why Burrell went back for Simoes, but I’ll touch on that later. Rene Simoes does have the necessary qualifications to be the Head Coach of the national team. However, those qualifications are only on paper as he has a lot of shortcomings as a good coach. He was rehired to get us to the 2010 WC, and from the looks of things, he will be out of a job soon. He has been in the job for nine months and given the fact that he has a more talented pool of players to select from, most fans believe that he has had more than enough time to form a team that could get us to the promise land. His choice of not selecting better and more experienced international players is a matter for debate and may prove to his downfall. Having been in that position during his first stint, he chose not to go down that road again. Basically speaking, having these “better” and more experienced international players, who lack the necessary discipline and commitment to the team, goes against the man’s grain and beliefs. He chose to implement a structure and footballing concept to the team rather than using his “best” available players that would have given us a better chance to qualify. He has to suffer the consequences for his choices, come what may.

In my opinion, it is very unfortunate that we are constantly placed in this situation because of our greed and unrealistic expectations as paying fans. Horace Burrell is in a very precarious predicament. In order to move the program forward, he has to demand immediate and more times than not, unrealistic results in order to get us fickle Jamaican fans to pay money to come out and support our teams. Without the lack of support from the government or a rich benefactor, our progress will race forward at the pace of a snail. Corporate sponsors will not commit to the program if the team is not winning things and cannot qualify for even our regional tournaments.

The way forward as I see it if we fail to qualify (which I think is inevitable) is to follow the following steps:

• Publicly announce the start of the next Gold Cup Qualifiers Campaign so that corporate sponsors can pin their names against it.
• Restructure the current coaching structure by separating the role of the Technical Director and the Head Coach of the senior men’s team. The role of the TD should be one of creating and implementing the football programs and national philosophy into the various age group teams. The JFF should give the parish associations a clear mandate of soliciting sponsors to implement various age group competitions. These competitions should culminate into one national competition at the respective age level.
• Renegotiate Rene Simoes contract and keep him on as the national TD of our football programs. Give him the responsibility of hiring and firing the coaches for these national teams. His job should not include coaching any of our teams. His strength lies in conceptualizing and motivating people. It would be good to keep him on to inspire and convince the sponsors to invest in the program.
• Immediately proceed with the construction of the Academy. This should be up and running by the start of 2009. No more excuses.
• Partner with our higher learning institutions to offer FIFA approved certification courses to our coaches and referees. Invite internationally recognized teachers of the game to come here as lecturers. Actively solicit international clubs in professional leagues to host our local club coaches and administrators to observe their setup. These duties could fall under the responsibility of the TD.
• The JFF should either create a marketing division and hire qualified accomplished marketing professionals as staff or just hire a recognized marketing company, whichever one is more feasible. The image of the ReggaeBoyz product needs to be improved and properly marketed to maximize its earning power. We don’t have to wait on a particular competition or WCQ to be visible.

There are no quick-fix solutions to our football inefficiencies, so the JFF through Burrell needs to come clean to the public so we can as fans can readjust our expectations. This is just my two cents. Take it for what it’s worth.

Source: Time to Face Reality - Jangle
http://216.119.88.230/forum1/showthr...706#post128706

[Bricktop]

Save this for 2018 qualifying campaign...I guarantee you that the exact same points will need to be addressed then too...masochists the lot of you

[Jamaica2099]

Only if that were 100% true. Jamaica's Reggae Boyz lost by goal difference to Mexico by wrong team selection made by Rene Simoes.

[Jangle]

Try as I might to avoid it, my blind support for the Boyz is fast going down the same road as my support for the WI team. That day is still some ways off still.

[Assasin]

YOW!!! hold off pon them thing yah. Is like we right off the thing as been dead already.

Wait until after the game them play nuh brethren. The team need the support right now. They still can surprise and put it all togather even now.

We still have a competent team. RASTA Jawge(and mi nah talk bout caveman ).

Reggaboyz mi say.

[Jangle]

Another one from my archive.

Jamaica is Still Waiting to Exhale

With two wins now in the bag, and one more to go against a demotivated Canada, Jamaica’s chances of advancing to the Hexagon looks more promising than a month ago. Without a doubt, “Tappa” Whitmore must be given full credit for getting us to this position and must be allowed to continue. The players have responded tremendously well under his guidance and now the cries from the many pundits are that the decision to recall Rene Simoes as Head Coach was a wrong one. Even though the results may support those that are of the opinion that his recall was wrong, I will still hold onto my view that Burrell’s decision to bring him back was right.

If we revisit Jamaica’s state of football a year ago, we will remember that we all agreed that our football needed to change course, and change course fast. Here we were, an impoverished nation, paying a coach US$83K per month. That is almost twice the amount of annual salary that the average American makes. Bora spent more time in his adopted homeland, Mexico, than he did in Jamaica. He attended few of our local games, and he committed the cardinal sin by making the comment that our FIFA rankings were not important. That showed a lack of respect and understanding of his employer’s and our players’ needs. It has now come to past that our low FIFA rankings have affected the country’s and our Boyz earning powers. Thank you Mr. Bora. That situation was untenable and had to change immediately. Burrell, following up on his pre-election mandate, appointed Simoes as Head Coach, specifically with the task of getting us to WC 2010. Burrell had already secured his investors prior to his reelection. He knew that these investors would only support the program and the WCQ campaign only if there was an internationally recognizable coach in charge. This was the biggest challenge that Burrell faced from the onset. Having made his appointment, he now had to stick with his decision and give Simoes his fair run. There was absolutely no way Jamaica could have paid some of the “name brand” coaches that were being brandished in the press, and given the fans’ greed for instant gratifications, he had to go with someone whom we could afford and had some form of a reputation. Why not reassemble the “old” team that got us to the Promise Land before? It made perfect sense.

Unfortunately for Burrell, history will show that his charge failed us miserably. What worked for us in the 98 campaign did not work this time around. Simoes reminds me of an old boxer who had past his prime and refused to quit the game. His tactics and selections were outdated and it proved the fact that his time away from the CONCACAF region was too long. He showed a lack of knowledge firstly, in the tremendous growth in the technical abilities and the skills of our homegrown overseas players by his non-selection of some of those players. Secondly, because of his ignorance of the Jamaican players, he misjudged the improvements made by our Caribbean neighbors and the lesser Central American teams who used his own previous strategy of using their overseas-based players to improve their teams. He also failed to appreciate the fact that even though Mexico still remains a major force in CONCACAF, the other teams like USA, Jamaica, Costa Rica, Honduras, Trinidad & Tobago and Panama no longer fear them and hold them in awe as before. The average Jamaican fan knows that we now have the players that under the proper guidance, can beat the two powerhouse teams in CONCACAF, namely, the USA and Mexico. Simoes said it publicly, but judging from his tactics employed in the Canada, and especially in the Mexico game, he never showed that he believed that Jamaica could beat these teams in their backyards. So now we are left with “what ifs”.

Again, Burrell is faced with a sticky predicament of how to utilize John Barnes whom he has already appointed as Head Coach, and “Tappa” Whitmore whom is yet to fail. It would be seen by many as a serious case of injustice and a rather silly move to remove “Tappa” from his role or even to inject Barnes into the camp with our situation so precariously poised. “Tappa” has been able to motivate our players and has gotten them to be playing at their best where Simoes, who is well known for his motivational skills, has failed. Over the last two matches, we have seen our Boyz playing with the same, and in some cases, more verve, vigor, and commitment that they do for their foreign clubs, than we have ever seen them before. I am pleased to see Fuller and Shelton running 30, 40 yards back into the midfield to tackle the opponents. I am equally ecstatic to see Jamaal Campbell-Ryce, a UB40 at that, using his blistering speed and skills to completely control the right-hand side of the field both in attack and in defense. I am excited to know that the coach will have a headache to determine who he will start in Omar Daley or Rudolph Austin. Omar Daley had an outstanding game last night, and Oneil “Bigga” Thompson did an admirable job as the holding midfielder. I am overjoyed at the performances of our defensive unit in the former “Cane-Cutter” Claude Davis, the “Granny” Tyrone Marshall and “Father Time” himself, Ian “Pepe” Goodison. Ricardo “Bibi” Gardener will never see that wing-back position again for Jamaica especially after the outstanding performances of Demar Phillips. Should the coach re-insert Marlon King instead of Luton Shelton for the Canada game? Despite Shelton’s most annoying flaw of his lack of a good first touch, he has done admirably well in keeping the opposing defenders on the back foot with his blazing speed and initiating our defending from the front. Does the coach start King, a proven goal scorer with an excellent first touch, and risk disrupting the chemistry of the team? Come November 19, all these questions will be answered. Until then, Jamaica is Still Waiting to Exhale.

Source: Jamaica is Still Waiting to Exhale
http://www.reggaeboyzsc.com/forum1/s...583#post135583

[Muadib]

Reggaeboyz will get to the final Six.

At dat point any clock can strike...

Unnuh need fi calm down.. wi months and months away from doomsday talking.

Guatemala and Antigua don't have a chance in this group.

[Jangle]

I totally agree with you about Guatemala and Antigua.

[Reggaedoc]

BTW are we just aiming to get to the group of six. Is that the extent of our ambition, or are we supposed to be trying to get to the big dance?.

[Bricktop]

I can hear the excuses now...they get more creative after each failed campaign...

[Muadib]

One step at a time...

No point panic over the state of the team now when it will have a entirely different complexion and dynamic by the time wi reach last stage..

With the talent we have available the right chemistry developed will make a serious contender for top 3 out of Concacaf...

[Bricktop]

With the talent we have available the right chemistry developed will make a serious contender for top 3 out of Concacaf...

Where have I heard this before? Oh yeah...right here on the forum before each failed campaign

[Muadib]

You have to understand the dynamic.

Jamaica poor performance in regional competition leading up to qualifying has placed them continually in "Group of Death" scenarios where qualifying out of those groups are actually harder then getting a 4th position out of 6.

This qualifying we had a strong performance in regional competitions.. Caribbean Cup and Gold Cup.. thereby giving us a much higher seeding and placing us in Anti-Group of Death..

Jamaica is easily a 4th place candidate in a Final 6 scenario right now.. give the team a long period of playing together and we will be a strong candidate for 3rd Place.

Everyone should be excited... but mi will enjoy the panic and yapping in the meantime..

[Jamaica2099]

Where have I heard this before? Oh yeah...right here on the forum before each failed campaign

What about the successful campaign where Jamaica started out with less. you are slowly reminding me of Big and Small Magician who hate Jamaica with a dose of poison. The only difference is they are Trinis.

[Bricktop]

What about the successful campaign where Jamaica started out with less. you are slowly reminding me of Big and Small Magician who hate Jamaica with a dose of poison. The only difference is they are Trinis.

So because we have an inept football federation means I hate Jamaica? Do you support the policies of PNP or the JLP...if not, does that mean you hate Jamaica? Try again