The meeting of this country’s football technical heads went for close to three hours at the Dr Joao Havelange Centre of Excellence on Saturday and was described as a success by Trinidad and Tobago Football Federation technical director Lincoln Phillips.
Warner along with TTFF President Oliver Camps and General Secretary Richard Groden were also present while local sports personality Anil “Spalksman” Roberts also showed up to voice his opinions and support for the “Soca Warriors’.
Several issues were discussed, chief among them being steps which should be taken to ensure that the team is adequately prepared in the coming two months for the final round of six which kicks off on Ash Wednesday. It was agreed that national coach Bertille St Clair will now meet with members of the technical committee to discuss measures to ensure the team takes top shape for their matches against Panama, Guatemala, Costa Rica, Mexico and the United States.
As Warner put it, “No stone shall be left unturned” and he stressed to all the other officials that because it was probably the best chance to see a national team qualify for a World Cup in their working lifetime, he intends to go the full distance to see the team through to Germany.
“The meeting was an absolute gem,” Warner said. “The discussions were of a very high nature and coming out of this is the collective wisdom that the technical structure of the team has to be reviewed immediately and more critical roles must be given to the technical director Lincoln Phillips and Alvin Corneal.”
Warner added that later today, specific roles and functions for the two men would be finalized. A proper system of organization for the period leading up to February and the rest of the campaign will also be implemented, according to Warner.
“One thing that was common this morning is that everyone expressed the view that it is quite possible for us to qualify and that if we put our heads together we will do so,” Warner said.
Phillips added “We must know what we are preparing for in the next stage. We have Panama and Guatemala who I think are two teams that we can beat. We have to look at these two teams and schedule practice sessions and matches against countries that play similar to them. We need 12 points to qualify and if we beat these two teams, that’s 12 points and then we look at the likes of Mexico who is not as good as people think they are, if we prepare well for them, we can beat or at least take a point from them. We must decide how we will approach matches against the USA and Costa Rica.
Corneal said it was important that the current T&T team is properly analyzed in order to see what improvements must be made.
“We have got to understand realistically that the ages of players are changing and their movements are getting sometimes slower and their concentration methods are reducing tremendously. As Lincoln rightly pointed out, we also need to assess our opponents Fortunately for some of us, we’ve gotten to know them well over the years and if we are to beat them, we must understand them better, their weaknesses and strengths and their transitions that they are going through.
“Across the world every national coach has someone who he speaks with and who he sends to do analysis and someone who takes an overview. This situation is no different. It’s just that it will be highlighted because we have not become accustomed to those sort of method. We have become accustomed to a national coach doing his own thing and not really looking at other people who can help. We have to progress and if we are to do this, we’ve got to put more minds to it,” Corneal explained.