FIFA Vice President Jack Warner has announced that members of the “Soca Warriors” will visit the Penal/Debe area and other parts of North, Central, South and Tobago at a road show scheduled to take place on May 11 and 12. Warner, speaking at the closing ceremony at an E Licence Coaching Course for participants of schools and clubs of the Penal/Debe Regional Corporation, revealed that skipper Dwight Yorke and his team will tour Tobago on May 11 and then hit the road from Piarco straight to Princes Town and back up on May 12. This all follows the farewell match against Peru which kicks off at 6:30pm at the Hasely Crawford Stadium on May 10 before the team heads off for its World Cup campaign.
“Particularly we want the children of Penal/Debe to come out and see the team and we will also have lunch in that area to allow the players to understand too that there are more things in life than chicken, and callaloo and pelau but there is doubles and dhal. Then we go to Princes Town and then back up the road,” Warner said.
Speaking, particularly after returning from Zurich where FIFA announced no action would be taken against him for allegations of wrong doings regarding T&T’s 2006 World Cup tickets, the CONCACAF President added: “That might not be good news to some people that I am still being called Vice President of FIFA. There have been so many attempts at character assasination sometimes that if at the end of the day I wonder if having qualified for the World Cup was really worth it. I want to find out sometimes if the legacy that we will have where not the team, the players, what they are doing, the performance of the coach but Jack Warner’s character being attacked is the legacy which we are leaving. I have been taught many times that no one is given more than he can bear.”
Hence he called for the success of the team and the continued development of football be the catalyst for change in T&T.
“ I decided to make a deliberate effort to make football a national sport and we shall do so collectively.”
“We are lucky that we are the beneficiaries of the world’s greatest sport. It is the only sport where you can be tall, short, fat or slim, you will still be welcomed. Football can change the world, wars have been fought and stopped because of football. You all were here when the team came back from Bahrain and you saw all the people together. They did not ask who was Black or Indian or White. The power of football was able to do that, only for a few days I admit but I tell you it’s a good start and we must continue the fight,” Warner added.