International Football magazine slams SVGFF

The St. Vincent and the Grenadines Football Federation (SVGFF) and football in this country have been slammed in an international magazine.{{more}}

The influential football magazine, World Soccer, published monthly out of Britain, with an international circulation in print and online, ran a story in its May issue which is far from flattering of the new Executive body of the St. Vincent and the Grenadines Football Federation (SVGFF).

The story is written by one Steve Menary, who is described by the magazine as one of its “worldwide network of correspondents”.

Writing under the innocent-sounding headline of “3 Time for local talent”, Menary makes reference to the exit of English coach Colwyn Rowe, who quit his post as national team coach less than 12 months into a 3-year contract. He quotes Rowe as attributing his departure to “too much interference in team affairs by the country’s Federation Board of Directors”.

“I left because of the new executive,” Menary quotes Rowe as saying, “…We had different views of the way forward.”

The correspondent does not stay there, but harks back to a previous English coach of the SVG national team, Stewart Hall. This gentleman apparently told Menary that the SVGFF is “underfunded, understaffed and has few facilities or equipment.” Hall apparently went even further, saying, according to the magazine, that “Most pitches (in SVG) are cricket pitches and have a raised square marked in the middle.”

Menary follows this up with quite damning quotes from Hall.

“Everybody knows everything, but nobody does anything,” he says of local football officials.

“If you organize national training, half the players don’t turn up.”

He says the same of coaches, concluding by characterizing the state of football in SVG as having “no discipline, concentration or focus.”

The one countervailing note in the article came from positive remarks attributed to star striker Shandell Samuel concerning the appointment of former national player, Cornelius Huggins, as national coach. Samuel expresses confidence in Huggins and is quoted as saying:

“Cornelius knows the players best. He’ll get the best out of them”.