Barbados can be the regional leader in football development once it is prepared to invest in proper playing surfaces.
So says international football development officer for Chelsea, David Monk, who believes the country has a glut of talented juniors that would be better served developing their techniques on “truer surfaces”.
Monk made the comment during yet another of the English Premiership club’s talent identification camps at Kensington Oval yesterday.
“Yeah, it’s great when we come and there is the glitz and the glam of the Oval – which is fantastic – but it’s when these kids go back to their clubs and lack the actual opportunities to play on good facilities like AstroTurf pitches week in and week out,” said Monk.
“As we know, here the weather can change three seasons in one day which is difficult for maintaining good grass pitches, but the AstroTurf at Wildey provides a good platform so these players can be consistent on consistent surfaces and learn techniques on good surfaces.
“And yet we’ve such a massive improvement with the kids, and we feel that having toured the whole of the Caribbean for the Digicel programme, that Barbados could potentially be at the forefront of football development, but we hope that facilities can be developed, with the likes of the University of the West Indies who have a fantastic facility in construction at the moment,” he added.
The week-long talent identification process is just part of the third phase of a three-year partnership between Chelsea and the Barbados Tourism Authority that started earlier this year.
With 50 local players already enrolled in their programme, the Chelsea coaches have been spending the last week trying to select new young talent to restock five different age categories when the original players graduate next year.
“It’s a continuation of the development programme whereby we’re actually redoing the process we started in July, so it will be a continuing flow of players where we refill each age group,” explained Monk.
“We’re constantly replenishing the talent on the island and they now get the opportunity to be coached twice a month by the best coaches on the island.
“But it’s not an overnight fix; it’s not going to be something where tomorrow we will produce an Emmerson Boyce. What we’re going to do is that these players here in five years’ time will be your national under-18 players,” he added.
Monk and his coaching officers, who have visited Barbados four times for the year, are scheduled to return in November to run their second coaches’ education workshop.
