The first batch of football uniforms and gear to officially jumpstart the deal between UK sportswear supplier Avec Sports and the ousted T&T Football Association under president William Wallace is set to arrive in T&T on June 1.
However, Wallace who is one of two signatures on the contract, is already counting it a lost cause, saying the world governing body for the sport - FIFA, with whom they are battling to remove the Normalisation Committee which was appointed on March 27, has already rejected the sponsorship money because of the involvement of him (Wallace) and his vice presidents Clynt Taylor, Sam Phillips and Susan Joseph-Warrick. The first part of the deal will entitle the shipment of uniforms and gear to outfit all the country's national teams at a value of $1.4 million.
Thereafter the embattled football association will be required to sell £$125,000 or 7,500 replica shirts and other gear for the UK company, and the profit from the sales will be shared 80 for Avec and 20 per cent for the TTFA and Sports and Games, the local distributors.
On Tuesday, Robert Hadad, chairman of the FIFA-appointed Normalisation Committee said he had no comment on the matter via a Whatsapp message.
When contacted Wallace said Hadad has received orders to reject any help deal that was created through the previous Wallace administration.
Wallace said that because they are being considered persona non grata by Hadad and the FIFA, that five other potential contracts that can provide much-needed financial assistance to T&T football have been turned down, including Caribbean Chemicals and Agencies Limited which had decided to pump $1.5 million a year for four years to properly maintain football fields but pulled out of the deal on March 19, while four others which were to be confirmed fell apart after FIFA's Normalization committee was announced.
Guardian Media Sports understands that the TTFA was expected to sign other sponsorship arrangements last March.
Wallace who is also president of the Secondary Schools Football League (SSFL) dismissed a claim by former Guyana Football Federation president Clinton Urling that in the case of a normalization committee, the FIFA will provide the funding upon the implementation of a programme to liquidate the debt etc.
Wallace instead referred to one of the mandates of the normalization committee which is to establish a debt repayment plan that is implementable by the TTFA, saying the FIFA never said it will pay off the football association debt.
“I will withdraw my fight with the FIFA in the morning if the FIFA uses its money to clear the debt,” Wallace said.
At present, the TTFA has no uniforms with the expiration of the Joma kit deal in 2018 and the tournament deal with Capelli which was just for the Gold Cup (June 15 to July 7, 2019) could find itself in a mad rush for uniforms with the FIFA World Cup qualifiers, the CONCACAF Gold Cup and other qualifiers and matches to begin soon.
Wallace in a presentation to jumpstart his campaign for TTFA ascendency early last year, listed several sponsorship deals that would come to fruition only once he became TTFA president, inclusive of the contract with world sportswear giants Nike. Yesterday Wallace admitted that the Nike deal was a legit one that was only hampered by people who claim to love the sport but were doing everything in their power to destroy it.
CONCACAF's senior counsel for North American Sports Marketing Zoe Braithwaite said in a release last year that there was no deal between the United T&TFA and global sporting apparel giant Nike.
SOURCE: T&T Guardian