My advice to the Reggae Girlz
THE EDITOR, Sir:
JAMAICA’S REGGAE Girlz qualified for next year’s FIFA Women’s World Cup by defeating Panama on October 17 in their third-place play-off in Frisco, Texas. It seems like yesterday that the Reggae Boyz qualified for the 1998 World Cup, which also took place in France.
Our opening match against Croatia was played in Lens – the pronunciation of which proved a challenge to persons in our football administration. My advice to the Reggae Girlz and their entourage is to get 50 to 100 hours of French under their belt before boarding their flight for France. It is nice when you can state your name, nationality and occupation in a foreign language. It is good to know about the French sports newspaper, L'Équipe. Even if you cannot understand the articles, especially those about you, you can get feedback from someone who also knows English.
VENUES
Our team will be playing at the following venues: Stade des Alpes (Grenoble), Stade du Hainaut (Valenciennes) and Stade Auguste-Delaune (Reims) in the group stage. It is important that we be able to pronounce the names of the venues at which we will be playing and the names of the cities. It would also be good for us to be able to pronounce the name of the venue in Group C at which we will not be playing: Stade de la Mosson (Montpellier).
It is also advisable that we be able to pronounce the names of the remaining venues: Parc Olympique Lyonnais (Lyon), Parc des Princes (Paris), Allianz Riviera (Nice), Roazhon Park (Rennes), Stade Océane (Le Havre). This is partly to make an impression. The French Women’s League is strong. We need to impress not only by our skills in the middle, but by our ability to learn languages.
The experts don’t see the Reggae Girlz emerging from Group C. La Mosson, where we will not play in the group stage, is the only Group C venue with a capacity of over 30,000. The three stadiums in which we will be playing have the smallest capacity in the competition.
Let us go out there and confound the experts! NORMAN W.M. THOMPSON Department of Humanities Northern Caribbean University Mandeville