Yet another court case

The call by volleyballers to have the second sport court acquired by the executive of the St Vincent and the Grenadines Volleyball Association placed in the countryside is merited.

With one already down at the Girls’ High School in capital Kingstown, expediency is stalled with the laying down of the other, as a battle has erupted over where it should be placed.{{more}}

Those who have followed the sport of volleyball over the past five years would concede that the bulk of players who make up the national teams are from the Windward side of the mainland.

They often have to travel to Kingstown to train, which, of course, incurs costs to the players, who in the main are teenagers.

Players from the locales of Dickson, and to some extent South Rivers, are the most accomplished volleyballers in stock, with a spattering from Kingstown and its suburbs and the Belair/ Dauphine areas.

No longer are the communities of Layou and Dauphine/Gomea the breadbasket of volleyball, as over time, the Layou Tornadoes and Gomea Bombers have faded into extinction.

Therefore, anyone pushing for the sport court to be placed elsewhere has to think again and wake up to present day realities.

The call, though, may not be that of the executive members of the Volleyball Association, but that of those persons who call the shots within the governmental circles. As is the case, every national sporting association here in St Vincent and the Grenadines in some way or the other is dependent on central government.

They look to the government machinery for varied forms of assistance.

Such is the bureaucracy of the system, which sometimes acts as an impediment rather than a means to accelerate progress in the respective disciplines.

Whilst it is the case, it should not be so, as a wider national outlook should take precedence, instead of a possible partisan political gain.

The good thing, though, in this instance, is that in the sport court has already landed and it may be the best interest of the authorities to fast track its commission, especially since at this juncture the sport is receiving a lot of airplay.

So, are we going to prolong the debate on this second one, drag it on and provide more political fuel for a single person’s myopic view?

There were similar procedural delays which saw the belated installation of the first court at the Girls’ High School venue last year.

Backtrack to 2012 when Team Crew won the inaugural Guinness Street Football title in Guyana and was offered a football pitch as their prize.

This never materialized, as objections were placed when the team members requested that it should have been placed in Sion Hill, and rightly so.

The end result was no court for Team Crew and Sion Hill, by extension, was denied a facility.

Likewise, since the revelation was made in 2013 that a beach volleyball facility could have been procured by St Vincent and the Grenadines, nothing has materialized except rhetoric and grand standing.

Yet another case which could go through the windows while we continue to stick and protract matters involving our young sportsmen and sports-women.

We will then turn around and expect them to max out when they are sent to compete overseas.

In the case at hand, clearly, the placement of the court in the rural community of Dickson should be a non-starter, as more mileage can be had by just facilitating the process and not erecting those unnecessary barriers.

Those who call the shots would be better positioned to earn their stripes as having contributed instead of frustrating an already obvious and best choice.

Additionally, we know that the season is fast approaching when the populace would be getting another opportunity to ink their voting finger. Less said.