Gordon achieving a lot at Lennon

Western Bureau

Head coach for the Lennon High School football team, Merron Gordon, is quietly building a legacy at the school

Having guided Lennon to the ISSA-FLOW Ben Francis knockout final for the first time in their history, Gordon has cemented his place in that institution's sporting annals.

Gordon, who first tasted success as the coach for Lennon's female footballers back in 2005, says he remains humble and dedicated to bringing the best out of his players.

Then fresh out of the G.C. Foster College, Gordon ended up at Lennon High School, where he took charge of the girls' football programme, making them the most successful female high school team in the country at that time.

He was then asked to take the reins of the daCosta Cup team soon after and, in between that, he featured with the national U-15s and Under-17s before taking a job coaching the national senior women's team.

"Those were good years in which I learned plenty from some real good and experienced coaches, and they have, to this day, been the significant reason I continue being as good as others say I am," Gordon stated.

He noted that coaches Christopher Dawes and Kevin Williams (formerly of Dinthill Technical) were the two who took a special interest in his development as a young coach.

"I was part of a group understudying these two coaches for premier league certification and then, luckily, I was coaching the Reno FC Girls and (Wendell) Downswell was the technical director, and he also played a vital role in my development," added Gordon.

Gordon is enjoying the successes coming his way, albeit he never played competitive football at any level. Instead, it was cricket that held his attention as a young man attending Glenmuir High.

In 2008, Lennon reached the semi-finals of the daCosta Cup with Gordon at the helm. They did even better in 2010, reaching the final for the first time in the school's history, where they were defeated by Rusea's.

Last year, Gordon and his assistant, Sherlon Lennon, took the school to the semi-finals of the two premier rural-area schoolboy football competitions, the daCosta and Ben Francis Cups.

-P.C.