Doh beat up on dem

It must be a difficult to be growing up here in these times as a teenager or as a young adult.

They are faced with a dilemma, as they are damned if they do and dammed if they don’t.

They are ridiculed if they stay idle and get into mischief and similarly, when they get involved in things which are positive, criticisms also come their way.{{more}}

Two recent sporting events staged here – the ECCB OECS Under-23 Netball Tournament and the Caribbean Football Union‘s male Under-17 Football Tournament, have led this column to reach that assessment.

St Vincent and the Grenadines (SVG), in the case of netball, failed to hurdle Grenada in their last match at the Arnos Vale Netball Complex, which, if they had won, would have brought the sub-regional title here for the 15th time.

And, last week, the Vincentian lads at the Victoria Park, were beaten by all comers – Grenada, Bermuda and St Lucia.

To add salt to the wounds, the youngsters did not register a single goal in their three matches.

What followed the Vincentians’ shortcomings were some venomous and unsavoury comments directed at the young ladies, who gave of their best in the circumstances, but were bettered by their opponents in the final match.

More was to come last week at the Victoria Park in the football, as the players and the coaching staff were hauled over the coals by some spectators who showed up at the venue, obviously expecting SVG to win.

Winning for male football teams has become a mountainous adventure for the past 11 months.

So, it must be heart wrenching for spectators to endure more agony.

In fact, SVG’s male football teams have lost their last 11 matches on the trot. The senior team has gone winless on the trot for eight matches, with the Under-17’s adding the last three defeats to the tally.

Closer examination by those who watched the matches at the Victoria Park would have revealed some effort at construction on the part of the young Vincentians, from which it can be concluded that some coaching was done by Messrs Richard Hayde and Lamont Hector.

The players who were on show in the two sporting disciplines and tournaments under review, are the same ones who light up local competitions and who are sometimes hailed as “good;” however, their talents and abilities, when gauged against others, then become relative.

But in the case of the football, one has to spare a thought for the Vincentian sporting public, who could have been duped into a sense of false expectations, based on several of the pronouncements which have come from the hierarchy of the local set-up.

The casual listener of such statements would often be led to believe that the sport is at its best state of existence since started here.

Far from it, as the facades are mere rhetoric of boastings on emptiness, as the results then expose where we are in relation to others in the region.

In both instances, what is seen displayed on the court or on the field, are testimonies of the structures which are in place for the two disciplines’ progress.

SVG did not have the necessary preparatory work to stand up strong in either tournament.

Five of Grenada’s Under-23 netballers were fresh from a tour of England, while Grenada, Bermuda and St Lucia footballers were at it for some time, with the latter together since 2014.

If we fail to prepare, then prepare to fail.

Preparations do not start one or two months prior to tournament engagements, but at the earliest stage of the players’ interest in the sport.

We continue to harp and hold on to competitions as the yardsticks of development in sports in SVG.

We take youth development for granted and simply as some type of ad-hoc arrangement, not accepting that what is done at the very tender ages, either make or break the players.

As a result, the reverse methodologies take place, as youth teams across the wide spectrum of sports here are invariably given the least knowledgeable and experienced coaches.

Also, the sports politics which exist reward friends, family and loyalists to the executive in office with coaching assignments to national outfits, even though these personnel do not possess the acumen.

But it goes deeper than when players reach the stage of national representation.

There are clear indications that football and netball need an overhaul, changes in direction, changes in the structures and revamping of the way things are done.

More so, there has to be a definitive national policy on sports, away from the recreational attainments to objectives of achievements of pride and economic viability.

So, doh always beat up on the players, as the administrators are the ones who shape the policies and eventually execute them.

Sadly, in some instances, both netball and football have institutionalized harum-scarum forms of development; hence, what we do is what we get.