-six other clubs also lend support
The pre-Kashif & Shanghai tournament drama took another twist yesterday when president of Alpha United Football Club Odinga Lumumba said that his club will not be participating unless there are better monetary rewards for the teams and players.
He reiterated that Alpha’s position “remains clear” and his team will not be participating under the economically straining circumstances set out by the K&S organisers. The winning prize for this year’s tournament stands at $2 million and the preparation fee is $50,000.
Lumumba, who is also Advisor to the President of Guyana on Empowerment, said yesterday that unless the structure of the tournament of the end-of-year tournament undergoes a change, the former champions will not be participating. These issues were discussed yesterday at a private meeting at the Water Chris Hotel.
“Two things we want to deal with; we want to deal with the preparation money, which we think should go up to $200,000 and the prize money should go up to $3 million. We are going to write the sponsors and ask for some intervention, including the government, and the three major sponsors.
“We are also going to write the GFF to facilitate the discussion. A lot of members also feel every time a team gets knocked out or move forward (in the tournament) there should be some incremental compensation,” Lumumba said.
Further, officials of six leading clubs, including this year’s defending champions Western Tigers, have also come out in solidarity of their colleague to demand more feasible prize packages for the 18 teams that are scheduled to participate.
At that meeting a private with officials of the clubs, Stabroek Sport also learnt that members of the clubs have long been disenchanted with the prize monies and preparation fees that the organisers have been giving.
Members of the Guyana Defence Force (GDF), Conquerors, Seawall, Buxton United, Western Tigers and Rosignol United football clubs were the other representatives at the meeting yesterday.
According to some of the officials, who requested anonymity, the tournament has received a groundswell of corporate and public support and therefore a better slice of the monetary pie should trickle down to the players. The tournament’s 21st edition will kick off on December 12 at the Guyana National Stadium.
“What we (the officials of the other clubs) are proposing is $3 million and incremental in terms of when a team win they get $50,000 and when you lose you go home with $25,000. Preparation fee we are asking for $200,000 and we are asking the GFF to intervene on the behalf of the clubs,” the official declared.
Stabroek Sport also learnt that the clubs will be penning a letter to the Guyana Football Federation (GFF) today to outline their position. With this, the officials will also recommend that the GFF collect a contract from the K&S Organisation which must specify what they plan to do for the development of the game after the tournament is concluded on January 1, 2011.
Lumumba believes that the GFF should see such a document before sanctioning the tournament.
“We also want the GFF to have a contract from Kashif and Shanghai before they sanction this programme, the agreement that Kashif has made in the past, what they are going to put into football, there must be a contract signed by GFF stating that this is what we will do for football after the tournament,” Lumumba emphasised.
On the other hand, Lumumba and the other members of the clubs said that they do not have a problem with sponsors and the monies that they are ploughing into the tournament but rather the “small amount that is trickling down to the players, clubs and the sport.”
When Stabroek Sport asked some other officials what their next step will be if the GFF does not agree with their position they said that that they will collaborate to make a decision, especially since “Alpha has already made its position clear about participating in the tournament.”
When asked why this concern was not made earlier, an official pointed out that “there have been larger sponsorship packages for the tournament this year .” It was reported that the three major sponsors this year, Guyana Telephone & Telegraph (GT&T), Demerara Distillers Limited (DDL) and Ansa Mc Al, have given over $30 million for the tournament.
Meanwhile, when Stabroek Sport spoke to co-director of the K&S Organisation, Kashif Muhammad yesterday he said that they are “feverishly working on getting everything organised” for the tournament.
He said that the organisation will be releasing the prize scheme for the tournament since the organisers have already sent in the scheme to the GFF and it was approved.
“As a matter of fact we have sent it in to the GFF and they have approved it. We have had meetings with the Guyana Football Federation, we got the positive sanction and we also got the sanction for the youngsters for them to go to Trinidad,” Muhammad stated.
According to Muhammad there will be a venue tour shortly. Also from all indications the organisation found out that teams will be participating despite the inclement weather.
When Stabroek Sport spoke to Muhammad he said that he had not heard of Alpha United pulling out of the tournament but stated that the GFF will be sending letters to the participating teams, whereby they will be required to respond.
“Pretty soon we will be hearing whether everybody will be playing or not,” Muhammad pointed out while adding that should Alpha United not play “that would not have any impact on the tournament because the tournament is the tournament.”
“People have been looking for it for years and years and years. It will be unfortunate because this is a very competitive team and everybody wants to beat Alpha United. Some of the teams might be happy…but they (Alpha United) definitely brought good quality football to the tournament but be that as it may we are going to have 18 teams,” Muhammad said.
