Dear Editor: For the players’ sake, TTFA must save futsal from self-appointed president Geoffrey Edwards

“[…] Educators refer to ‘recency and frequency’ as part of the learning process, and when you look at our players, they all possess tremendous individual skill. It follows therefore that the more they play futsal, the more adept at it they will become. 

“A national futsal league, not necessarily a professional one, can only redound to the benefit and enhance personal development of the individual players. 

“This reality has bypassed [Futsal Association of Trinidad and Tobago president Geoffrey] Edwards…”

The following letter to the editor on the supposed underdevelopment of futsal in Trinidad and Tobago by president Geoffrey Edwards was submitted to Wired868 by former National Futsal Team manager Ronald Brereton:

Last night at the Domo Polideportivo in Guatemala City, Guatemala, another attempt at Futsal World Cup qualifying by the Trinidad and Tobago Men’s National Futsal Team came to a predictable and painful end.  

For the record the touring party played four matches and lost all four, 7-1 and 8-2 versus Costa Rica, 6-2 versus the Dominican Republic and 4-3 against hosts Guatemala. 

There is a claim made about people who do the same thing over and over and expect different results, I make no such claim. However, Futsal Association of T&T president Geoffrey Edwards must accept full responsibility for this clearly unacceptable debacle.

Since the end of the failed attempt at qualifying in 2004, there has been talk about forming a futsal league in Trinidad and Tobago. To date, we are no closer to this; all because one man has no interest in such a venture. 

Educators refer to ‘recency and frequency’ as part of the learning process, and when you look at our players, they all possess tremendous individual skill. It follows therefore that the more they play futsal, the more adept at it they will become.

A national futsal league, not necessarily a professional one, can only redound to the benefit and enhance personal development of the individual players. This reality has bypassed Mr Edwards since 2016 when the then TTFA president David John-Williams asked him to organise a futsal league that the TTFA would assume full responsibility for. 

Since then, we play futsal only on Instagram, YouTube and Facebook to satisfy the inflated ego of the self appointed president of FATT. 

It was in this very forum that Keith Look Loy indicated there was no membership of FATT that the TTFA knew of; further they were non-compliant, since they had no registered constitution and never held elections. This must not continue.

Today, I call on the TTFA, through the normalisation committee, to intervene and bring some order to futsal in Trinidad and Tobago. As it stands, Mr Edwards—and by extension FATT—is accountable to no one. He is free to do what ever he wants with this grassroots sport. 

He keeps talking about five pillars of something, the last of which is a futsal league. In my mind, that and a pink donkey we will never see. 

You see, a league would mean facing the owners of futsal in Trinidad and Tobago, which is the players and the teams. It would require transparency and accountability and, of course, elections—all of which, it seems, he is mortally afraid of.

In closing, I congratulate the players for a sterling effort, especially in the match against Guatemala, and for having the courage to travel abroad in these troubled times. That is a true demonstration of patriotism and must be applauded. 

You carried yourselves well as model citizens of Trinidad and Tobago. The same cannot be said of Mr Geoffrey Edwards. 

He claims that his target for qualification is 2024. Who decided that? Then, in the absence of an organised futsal league and any structure for futsal development in Trinidad and Tobago, why did we enter a team? 

Mr Robert Hadad, you and your normalisation committee must rescue futsal from FATT.

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