Pouderoyen FC coach sees lasting impact on football from COVID-19
With competitive local football non-existent due to the Covid-19 pandemic, head coach of Pouderoyen FC Travis Bess, disclosed that the current situation has had a tremendous impact on the club’s developmental plans for the 2020/2021 season.
This was disclosed during an exclusive interview with Stabroek Sport yesterday. According to Bess, the developmental plans are currently at a standstill, as the management team is unable to structure and implement several policies geared for the ongoing season.
He stated, “The club is dormant at the moment, the players and the management team just interact via social media on the different leagues that are occurring and find out about the wellbeing of each other. The Covid19 pandemic has affected us terribly because we had invested in excess of US$1500 in equipment for the new season and hoped to complete the previous West Demerara League and to be crowned champion. The executive committee had high hopes for us in terms of how we would have performed in 2020 in the various national tournaments we would have been invited to …the Turbo Energy and the Limacol as well as the association level events.”
The former national Futsal goalkeeper opined that the impact of the current contagion will have a lasting impact on the local football landscape and new guidelines will be implemented to manage the game on a daily basis.
According to Bess, 39, “We are all sitting, hoping and praying for the best so we can get back on the field. It has already had a huge impact on the players and the coaches and will have further impact on the coaches to get the players back to the required fitness levels when the situation ends. Going forward, we will be playing with the same rules but different guidelines as we are already seeing in Europe. We now as coaches will have to try and get the players up to speed with the guidelines while trying to get the best out of them at the same time.”
He noted that the ongoing transfer window has been severely affected due to the current climate, adding that the impending transfer periods will be of utmost importance to the respective clubs, as they aim to improve their fortunes heading into the eventual resumption of the sport.
He further added, “The transfer window for us has already been affected because we would have used the first half of the league to look at players from various teams as we are always building and looking to improve our quality.
We were hoping to view some players but the lack of football due to the coronavirus, it will be hard to scout and eventually convince players to move. So the next two transfer windows will be very important for all the clubs at the moment. They will be used to secure quality players to improve their respective squads.”