McKENZIE TURNS TO TRINIDAD AND TOBAGO FOR CAP CALL

KiLMARnoCK midfielder Rory McKenzie looks set to become the latest Rugby Park star to graduate to international honours next month. However, the irvine-born 26-year-old won’t be pulling on the famous dark-blue jersey of scotland. instead, he’s looking forward to wearing the red and black of trinidad & tobago, who travel to Honduras for a nations League tie on november 17. it’s a remarkable turn of events for one-club man McKenzie, who is now in his tenth season as a first-team player at Killie. And he acknowledged the part played in his transformation from former scotland Under-21 star to soca Warrior by ex-Rugby Park captain Kris Boyd and Marvin Andrews. the former Rangers centre-half was part of the islands’ best-ever team when they qualified for the 2006 World Cup finals — and now he’s helping McKenzie follow in his footsteps after being given a tip-off from his former ibrox team-mate Boyd. McKenzie boosted his chances of a cap debut by notching the winner for Killie against Livingston on saturday and now he can’t wait to get started. ‘i’m in the process of making myself available to play for trinidad & tobago,’ he said. ‘it’s a long story but i’ve been in contact with them and i’m trying to sort that out at the moment. ‘i first looked into it years ago because one of my grandfathers, Bill Mossman, was born over there — his mum and dad had been in the Royal navy. ‘But we’ve been going back and forth for around four months now and i’d hoped i would have been involved in their matches during the recent international break. ‘Unfortunately, the paperwork didn’t go through in time. i reached out to them before and nothing really came of it, but this time the trinidad manager got in touch. ‘it was Kris Boyd — through his old mate Marvin Andrews — who set the wheels turning. Boydie and i had been somewhere and i mentioned this. He then phoned big Marvin and i spoke to him as well. ‘After that, the manager, Dennis Lawrence, texted me out of the blue a couple of sundays ago. i’ve subsequently spoken to him, too — he wanted to establish whether or not i was eligible to play for them.’ McKenzie has finally managed to overcome all the bureaucratic hurdles and is now ready to become the third player from scotland’s top tier — after Andrews and former Hibs, Rangers, Dundee United and Falkirk playmaker Russell Latapy — to represent the Caribbean contenders. ‘i’ve been sending all the documents over, so, if anything comes of it, great,’ he said. ‘obviously, it would be a great experience for me to travel the world and to play international football.’