THE RECOGNITION of the potential power of football in Barbados for progress has prompted the world governing body to financially assist the local association.
This was revealed by FIFA’s vice-president Austin “Jack” Warner in his feature address at the Barbados Football Association’s (BFA) 100th anniversary gala at The Crane Beach Resort on Saturday night.
In 2009, the BFA received a grant of $463 328 from FIFA, and in the last financial year, another grant of $456 240 came from the world body.
“FIFA, through its financial assistance programme and its Goal Project, has contributed to your development and this is not by chance,” Warner remarked.
At this year’s congress in South Africa, member associations were also informed that they would each receive an additional financial contribution of US$250 000 as a share in the success of FIFA’s 2009 financial profits.
“FIFA has done for you what it has not done in many countries much bigger than yours,” Warner told members of the football fraternity and the BFA’s corporate partners, who attended the banquet.
“FIFA’s partnership with the Barbados Football Association is predicated on the recognition of a potential and your drive for success and based on FIFA’s belief in your ability to make it,” he noted.
Warner, who is also CONCACAF president said FIFA’s appreciation of the “potential power of football in Barbados as a means of promoting progress” is what has kept the BFA on the radar of the world body.
“It is your ability to infuse into the hearts of young Barbadians the faith and reasonable expectation that Barbados will rise and it is that faith which has captured the imagination of many if not all of us,” he further contended.
Warner said the BFA had done well over the years but he urged local football administrators to use the centenary celebrations to become more cognisant of their responsibility and the direction needed to take Barbados football to a different level.
“For 100 years, you have laid a strong foundation and the significance of the achievement to this moment, must never be lost.
“This celebration only makes sense if as we reflect, it enables us to catch a vision of that path to Caribbean and global excellence in the not too distant future,” advised the Trinidad and Tobago minister of works and transport.
