New coach pleased with Under-17 football screening

NEWLY-APPOINTED Trinidad and Tobago Under-17 football coach Nigel Grovesnor is pleased with the current screening process underway. Sessions were held this week in various parts of Trinidad and sister isle Tobago to select players for the national U-17 team. “Things have been going well,” said Grovesnor, who also served as coach of national school football princes St Anthony’s College. “We’ve had sessions in Port-of-Spain, Arima, Point Fortin, Sangre Grande and Tobago and we’ll then be selecting a group for the final selection process on Tuesday (at a venue to be determined).”

A batch of 60 will be involved in Tuesday’s programme after which, Grovesnor stated, will be dwindled to 40 in time for next month’s start of official training as Trinidad and Tobago prepare for the Caribbean Football Union (CFU) leg of the FIFA Under-17 World Championship qualifiers. Other members of the technical staff include manager Winston St Clair, assistant coach Sean De Four and trainer Ricardo Stevenson. Concerning the actual screening events, Grovesnor said that the players “have been put into game situations and selected from there.” With regards to the turnout during the five-day sessions, Grovesnor noted that there was an average of 40-50 players per day, adding that “at the Under-15 level, there would not be such a large turnout but, to identify those we may have missed, we’ll be having another group of sessions in January.” The CFU qualifiers will be held from September 15-December 17 2004 while the World Championships will be staged in Peru the following year.