"We will most likely meet our obligation this year," chairman Gerry Hospedales said. But he hinted that without financial help, San Juan Jabloteh might not be able to produce a professional football team next season.
In speaking to the Express on Tuesday, Hospedales did not hide the fact that Jabloteh are in severe financial difficulties.
The 2003 Caribbean Club champions and four-time winners of the Trinidad and Tobago professional league, have been suffering since the January, 2009 demise of their main sponsors CLICO, whose financial collapse saw the Trinidad and Tobago Government take control of the insurance company.
As a result, Jabloteh held a Board meeting this week in which they looked at matters affecting the club.
"We are currently reviewing our financial structure to see what options we have," Hospedales said. "We have had a model that is no longer working effectively, and we are at this time looking at what we can do."
Hospedales further hinted that even with recently-introduced prudent measures, they were still having difficulties making ends meet.
Among the things Hospidales said that the club had hoped for, was to have a ground at their traditional Santa Cruz base developed by Government so that they could at least have make some money from home matches.
"When you look at CONCACAF Champions League matches in other countries, you see big crowds at the matches. In our game against Santos Laguna (Mexico), just 129 persons paid.
"There are games in the Pro League where we have to play a home game as far away as the Mannie Ramjohn Stadium, and just 10 persons pay to come in. How can we run a club on that? After 36 years it difficult to put up with this," Hospedales declared.
Until the recent CLICO debacle, Jabloteh were considered one of the bigger clubs in T&T, even hiring former England internationals Ricky Hill and Terry Fenwick as coaches.
Founded in 1974, Jabloteh have played at several levels on the lcub circuit, including the East Zone football competition and the National Football League.
San Juan Jabloteh became a semi-professional league team in 1994, and with the backing of CL Financial in 1996, the club significantly expanded their operations. From 1997 to 1999, the team finished fourth in the Semi-Pro League in three consecutive years.
Upon the creation of Trinidad and Tobago's first professional league in 1999, Jabloteh became one of the league's founding members.
Since joining, they have been the league's most successful club, winning the league championship in 2002, 2003, 2007 and 2008. Jabloteh also represented the league in the CONCACAF Champions' Cup in 2004.