![Flashback- Lionel Holder [no.6] of Guyana trying to evade the impending challenge of Rogyear Anita [right] of Curacao at the IMG Academy, Florida, USA in the CONCACAF Men’s U20 Championship.](https://s1.stabroeknews.com/images/2020/07/lionelholder-scaled.jpg)
Despite the uncertainty surrounding the resumption of local football, Golden Jaguar U20 International Lionel Holder, revealed that he continues to train in a structured weekly manner in an effort to maintain his physical conditioning.
This was revealed during an interview yesterday with Stabroek Sport. According to the versatile Guyana Police Force (GPF) defender, weekly sessions are conducted under the watchful eye of the experienced Theodore Henry. He elaborated, “I train in the morning with the rugby coach Theo Henry from 5:30-7. Personally I like to keep myself fit and anyone who knows me, will tell you that I always try to stay on top of my game with regards to fitness. Basically Monday to Friday we exercise at the Square of the Revolution and some Sundays we might do some work in the hills on Soesdyke Highway.” Holder, who has been capped three times at the U20 level, revealed that the structured regimen is created by Henry on a weekly basis, with fitness tests conducted at the start of every month to scrutinize the improvements made. He added, “He [Henry] does create a different training schedule for the week, so every month we do a fitness test to judge our improvements. During the month we basically do a lot of core work which includes everything inclusive of abdominals, push ups and sprints.”
He revealed that the current situation will have a severe impact on the football landscape, adding, “It will have a big impact, football is not playing and the players are not training and no one is focused on football due to the situation. We don’t know when the situation will finish, there is no date for that and the players are just focused on the current situation.”
Holder further disclosed, “Personally I believe that if football is to resume, many of the teams including Police would struggle. Hardly anyone is training at the moment. Everyone is working and not actively training and worrying about the situation. It doesn’t encourage you at the moment to train.”
Asked about his aspirations for the senior national programme, Holder, 21, said, “The dream as always is to play for the national team and play at the highest level but the way football is going it’s very hard to do that in Guyana. Most times it’s the international players who are called and not the locals but I am still working towards that. I am always working on my game and asking for advice from the coach on how to improve and what areas I am lacking. I would like the national team to invest more in the local players, I am not bashing the international players. We just need more representation in the national team.”
He added, “Definitely I want to be in the team but I want to see more investment into local football. Sometimes we play a tournament and then six months later we are playing again and not being able to see the improvements. We need more tournaments so we can play more and people will be more interested.”
