The Guyana Football Federation (GFF) officially kicked-off its maiden’s women’s only Concacaf W Level C Coaching Course yesterday at the National Training Centre, Providence, which featured participation from 24 aspiring coaches from the various sub-associations.
The seminar, which concludes on November 29th, and will be staged in its entirety at the aforementioned venue, will be administered by GFF Acting Technical Director Bryan Joseph and Coach Linsworth Gilbert. The aforesaid duo will be supervised by Concacaf’s Technical Expert and Coach Developer Anton Corneal. The forum will feature a combination of practical and theoretical sessions.
National Women’s Football Association President Andrea Johnson said, “Today is a historic day for women in football in Guyana. Never before have we had 24 female participants for any coaching course. For too long we have had a male dominated coaching staff for female teams, especially national teams. For Concacaf to be here in Guyana to do a C License coaching course for only women means that we are making another step towards development of the women’s game.”
Meanwhile, Corneal stressed that the “long term effect is actually growing the women’s game. Countries are at different starting points and we try to meet countries where there is a need. There is a need for women coaches. Concacaf has recognised that and has decided to spend a lot of time growing the women’s game. We need this effort, we need to ignite that growth.”
On the other hand, Joseph noted, “… at the final day we will do an assessment to determine whether you have passed or failed, the persons who are not yet quite ready to receive the license, GFF will continue to work with them over time and to help them develop and get to the level of competency that is required to attain the licence.”
GFF 1st Vice-President Brigadier (ret.) Bruce Lovell said, “In the footballing world there is a greater push to have more female involvement in football. We hear issues such as equitable access, equitable pay and so we are doing our part here at the GFF to ensure that we implement more programmes that will provide for greater female participation in the sport.”
