JACK WARNER has called on Government to provide an open budget for Dutchman Leo Beenhakker to prepare Trinidad and Tobago's national football team to compete in the 2006 World Cup in Germany.
Warner, the Trinidad and Tobago Football Federation's special adviser, made the comment yesterday at a press conference at the Garden Inn Restaurant, Crowne Plaza Hotel, Wrightson Road, Port of Spain. Also in attendance was Beenhakker, who left immediately after for Holland.
FIFA vice-president Warner said Trinidad and Tobago was the smallest country to qualify for the World Cup, the biggest stage in the world. He also said it would take some US$15 million to prepare T&T's footballers adequately for the competition and, even then, that amount would still be the smallest budget of all 32 finalists.
And Warner expressed his disappointment that, despite the fervor with which the people of Trinidad and Tobago greeted the team after qualifying for the World Cup, they were not prepared to give financial support to the players.
Two weeks ago when a Scotiabank account was launched to assist the players, Warner contributed $10,000, but disclosed yesterday that the fund had only reached $37,000 by Friday.
He called on the Government and the business community to take up the national cause in support of the Soca Warriors.
"Leo (Beenhakker) by himself can't do it, even with his best intentions. He has to be given the tools and I ask today for Leo to be given an open budget," said Warner, adding that all of his own resources would be made available to fund the Dutchman's programme.
In response, Minister of Sport and Youth Affairs Roger Boynes said, having met with Warner on Thursday, both parties had agreed to pool resources to have Trinidad and Tobago well prepared for Germany.
Boynes said among topics discussed was contracting Beenhakker for seven months in the first instance to handle the World Cup campaign, and a further two years for the T&TFF's development campaign.
"What will happen now is that we have an agreement by both sides whereby we will pool our resources together. We are committed to working with the T&TFF and provide the resources to ensure that our team is well prepared," Boynes declared.
And FIFA's calendar for friendly international matches has limited Beenhakker's preparations to just two warm-up games early in 2006.
The first takes place on February 8 in Europe, after which the Soca Warriors will give Trinidad and Tobago a farewell home game on March 29. It will be the last time the national footballers play here before the World Cup.
The main part of Beenhakker's preparations take place in May, when he will have the Warriors for a month prior to the World Cup tournament.
During that time the team will train in Europe and will also schedule several friendly matches.
Beenhakker will also leave one of his assistant coaches to work with ten locally-based players and will do the same in Europe. He told local players that the door is still open to those who can contribute to the team and have the required mentality to fit into a team structure.
Before leaving yesterday, Beenhakker made a plea to the authorities to protect the future of Trinidad and Tobago football. He said because the average age of the players in his team was 28, their time as players was limited.
"This team, which brought off this fantastic success, does not have much of a future," the Dutchman declared. He said the day will soon come when Dwight Yorke, Russell Latapy and most of the Soca Warriors will hang up their boots and asked where are their replacements coming from.
"My problem is what happened with the Under-20 team. We play qualification, then we sent them home. The Under-20s who played the qualifiers for Holland 2005 are the exact group of players who will play the qualifiers for the 2008 Olympics. Where are they?"
He also questioned the whereabouts of "Young Warriors", Trinidad and Tobago Under-15 footballers, who he described as playing beautifully in the Caribbean Football Union tournament earlier this year.
He said several of those players were very talented.
"What happened with that team? What did we do with them? We sent them home. Where are they?"
Beenhakker asked everyone concerned with football in Trinidad and Tobago to protect the future.
He voiced concern that World Cup participation would be the end product of football in Trinidad and Tobago and not the beginning of something great as it should be.