End of the road

There'll be action up in the north and down in the south, but here in Trinidad and Tobago, we will be observing in silence.

That's the situation we find ourselves in after the Soca Warriors suffered one defeat too many in the second round and T&T dropped out of the qualifying campaign for the 2014 World Cup even before it got serious.

While those fans who really love their football and stick with the national team through thick and thin will be grieving over T&T's elimination, there are some who feel that we were on a hiding to nothing and we got away from further embarrassment.

For if Trinidad and Tobago, who went to the World Cup finals just five years ago, cannot beat Bermuda and Guyana in 2011, then how could we expect to cope with Mexico and Costa Rica in the third round of CONCACAF Zone qualifying next year?

And those doomsayers certainly have a point.

But the optimists will claim that the T&T players, a mix of locally-based youngsters and journeymen and the well-paid overseas professionals, were only just starting to gel and would have been a much more cohesive unit in the next round.

On that point, two days after it all came to a screeching halt last Tuesday, the interim president of the Trinidad and Tobago Football Federation announces that the national team will be playing a series of friendly internationals in 2012, starting with Finland in January.

Did I miss something in translation, because we should have had that sort of programme in place this year. Or is it that everyone in the hierarchy of T&T football was so over-confident that we would easily hurdle inferior opponents like the Bermudans and Guyanese? Did they all forget already that the same Bermuda beat us here at home in qualifying for the 2010 World Cup?

So poor Otto Pfister—actually, he isn't poor at all, as he was paid a hefty salary as national team head coach--was never afforded the opportunity of seeing his charges— both local and foreign—up against high-level opposition in practice games in the lead up to the real thing in the second round of qualifying, which, unfortunately, turned out to be our last.

According to the TTFF stand-in, they couldn't afford to facilitate such warm-up encounters in 2011, but less than two months from now, he will find funds to fly in the Finland national team.

Before he told us something sensible, like that all the remnants of the TTFF's old guard are standing down and taking their leave, so that bright, young people with football at heart, like Marlon Morris, Brent Sancho and many others who really care for the game, can replace them. But there were no such words of wisdom coming forth from that now totally irrelevant organisation which has reduced Trinidad and Tobago football to the status of West Indies cricket, which is a pretty precipitous drop.

And, of course, there are those fans who place the blame squarely on those wearing the red, white and black, questioning the commitment of the players, their heart and desire and how many of them gave their all in contesting the 50-50 balls and chasing down the rebounds.

Ah, well, it's of little use crying over what might have been and the only consolation is that we won't be rubbing it in amongst ourselves and if any of the many Guyanese in our midst decide to give us heckle about beating us, they better make sure they have their papers in order or some aggrieved Trini will summon the nearest immigration officer.

So we must have pity for our countrymen and women residing abroad who happen to have a Guyanese living next door. Unfortunately, they have nowhere to hide and will be cursing whoever they feel is responsible for our early demise on the road to Rio 2014.

And spare a though for our most visible presence on the international airwaves, Shaka Hislop, the former Trinidad and Tobago goalkeeper who played such a crucial role in keeping Sweden at bay that memorable Saturday in June 2006, when all our hearts were bursting with pride and we walked tall in Dortmund after our very first appearance in the World Cup finals.

On the Monday edition of ESPN Soccernet Press Pass, with our fate already decided following T&T's 2-1 defeat at the Guyana National Stadium the Friday before, Shaka was asked about what went wrong.

As the much-respected ESPN analyst lamented about "Mr Jack Warner..." and how things began going downhill soon after the heroics in Germany with the blacklisting of players who made a claim for a share of the profits generated by the Soca Warriors making it to the biggest stage in sport, Shaka's fellow panellists got his goat.

Steve Nichol and Steve McManaman, two former Liverpool stalwarts, had absolutely no sympathy for Hislop, with Nichol searching around in his pockets looking for a handkerchief or tissue to wipe Shaka's tears, while "Macca" began playing an invisible violin to accompany Trinidad and Tobago's swansong.

For even though the Warriors saved some face the next day and won 2-0, it was of absolutely no use.

Instead, the Guyanese will get to experience the thrill and excitement of a full-blown World Cup qualifying campaign, against T&T's old adversaries Mexico, Costa Rica and El Salvador. I'll grudgingly wish them well, along with Antigua and Jamaica, as they scrap with CONCACAF's big guns.

And here, if we have to continue to depend on the same moribund minds of the TTFF to get us to another World Cup, those of us who had the good fortune to be in Germany will be long dead before our compatriots experience it again.

Marlon Miller is Sports Editor of the Express.

The funeral of the late Trinidad Football will take place at Clark and Battoo’s Chapel, thence to the Lapeyrouse Cemetery. The body, which was flown in from Guyana, will lie in state at the office of the Trinidad and Tobago Football Federation (TTFF). No flowers by request.
  
The phone rang. I picked it up half-heartedly. I was prepared for the shocker; but was hoping for some good news. “Guyana give we two,” was the sad news. One time, I headed for the toilet...no lie. My stomach gave away, and everything came crashing down. A sadness overwhelmed me, and it was difficult to collect myself. After that near-miss, I jumped into bed and pulled the covers over my head. I was dumbstruck.

My mind raced back to the glory days and fast-forwarded to what football in T&T had become. I started to cry. The neighbours rushed over to console me. There was this sexy one in a shortpants with legs as smooth as silk. She put her arms around me and instantly my troubles were over. They all left, telling me that whatever was troubling me “that, too, like the curfew shall pass”.

I couldn’t come to grips with what passes for football and, futhermore, I was not seeing any stars. Football had me seeing stars. However, my mind raced back to the cemetery of failed football campaigns—Road to Italy (1990), ’94 for sure, Korea in 2002. Is licks, Germany 2006, and South Africa 2010 and Brazil 2014.

Then it dawned on me the vengeance of Moko had blighted our football, after how the footballers were treated in 2006...called “mercenaries”, blanked from the Gold Cup squad all because of asking for what is rightfully theirs. Money flowed like gobar through that campaign.

There was enough for everybody. But men who never kicked a lime hogged everything. There and then, I knew local football was doomed. I prayed for justice. Since that time, Caribbean teams started to beat we like a bobolee and declare a national holiday to celebrate the death of a football superpower.

Remember, no flowers by request, a donation will be picked up for charity. The TTFF has requested all past and present members, including Jack Warner, wear black. What a sad story.