New Brazilian outfits for TT football team

FIFA Vice-President Jack Warner yesterday announced a four-year, US $1 million sponsorship deal with Brazilian sport apparel firm FINTA with the senior Trinidad and Tobago football team at the Queen’s Park Oval in Port-of-Spain. And he was in a biting mood. “You only know your friends when you are down,” said Warner in his address to a gathering which included national footballers Stern John and Anthony Rougier and national coach Bertille St Clair. The Special Adviser to the Trinidad and Tobago Football Federation (TTFF) commended FINTA and owner, partner and Chief Executive Officer Irisleuton Bertolini for coming to the aid of the TTFF.

Warner said although the team is currently struggling in the World Cup qualifying campaign he is confident of a  resurgence to top form which will prove all doubters wrong. He noted that the national community never takes their own advice or support their own products and as a result Bertolini had to come to the assistance of the national team when there are local companies who could have fitted the bill. Warner assured St Clair that the difficult period the team have experienced lately will make them stronger and this coupled with a new technical vision should see them coming out on top. He also commented on the controversy surrounding the recent 3-0 loss to Northern Ireland at the Dwight Yorke Stadium, Tobago. Dwight Yorke made an appearance for the home team which drew criticism to St Clair but Warner asked that the person who has not made a mistake should  cast the first stone.

Warner revealed that he will soon go to South Africa to engage in talks with former South African president Nelson Mandela and Archbishop Desmond Tutu and return to Trinidad and Tobago with a team of businessmen. He promised that the Woodbrook Playboyz Steelband, who accompanied the team on their recent two-match tour of England and played the national anthem at yesterday’s function, will continue to travel with the national team as the TTFF use two unifying entities — steelpan and football— to push the country forward. Earlier Bertolini described his company as “a young but committed entity in the football market,” established in 1985 and apart from Trinidad and Tobago also supplies the teams of  Haiti , Botafogo, Paysandu, Santa Cruz and Tupi of Brazil.