Invest FIFA funds in women’s programmes – Gilbert

Xavier Gilbert, coach of Jamaica Football Federation (JFF) Women’s Premier League champions, Waterhouse, hopes the recent FIFA clubs benefit programme funds, which have been allocated to seven local clubs for their role in the development of players, who participated in the 2019 FIFA Women’s World Cup in France, will go towards the female programmes of the respective clubs.

Of the seven clubs, only Rangers FC from St Mary and St Ann Women’s are exclusive women’s football clubs, with Harbour View, Los Perfectos, Arnett Gardens, Reno and Waterhouse all having more dominant male programmes within their setup.

However, Gilbert, a former national women’s coach, said he would like to see the clubs filter the funds back into the respective women’s programme to assist with training and continue the development of young female talents locally.

“I would like the (FIFA) funds to go back into the women’s programmes to help develop the youngsters. It is not a whole lot (of money), but it can help with training and development. I am sure the clubs are happy to have received this and will put most of it back in their women’s programme,” Gilbert commented.

He added that this financial recognition from the world governing body should serve as motivation to other clubs to invest in and develop their women’s programmes.

“I hope all the clubs around see how beneficial it can be when they pay attention to the women’s programme. Clubs stands to benefit under the new FIFA programme, so I hope others are motivated to invest more (money) and find time to help develop (female) players, because they can benefit when a team qualifies for a World Cup,” Gilbert said.

CLUBS REWARDED

FIFA, in recognising the important role local clubs play in developing the women’s game and in an effort to assist in improving professionalism, decided to reward these clubs, with US$22,518.40 ($J2.9 million) allocated to the JFF to distribute to affiliated clubs that contributed to the development of players who represented the country at the FIFA Women’s World Cup.

Of the seven clubs, Harbour View will benefit the most, after providing four players – Khadija Shaw, Daneisha Blackwood, Trudi Carter and Konya Plummer, who participated at the championship.

However, some players represented more than one club and in such cases, the allocation has to be shared between these clubs, depending on the amount of time spent and games played with the respective clubs.

Meanwhile, general manager of Harbour View, Clyde Jureidini, said his club will use the allocation to support other programmes as they no longer have a women’s programme.

“We are very fortunate to benefit. We had four local based players that went to the World Cup and we are proud of their achievement and grateful for the allocation. It’s not a large sum, but it’s a considerable sum and will help the overall club process,” Jureidini said.

“It’s not enough that we could look at restarting the female programme. It’s far from that, so we will add it to our general football development for all our six teams,” Jureidini added.

JFF general secretary, Dalton Wint, like Gilbert, says there are benefits to be gained if clubs invest in developing their female programmes.

“FIFA has allocated some funds to clubs who provided players who participated in the World Cup. They are very fortunate to have a little over US$22,000 to share up. We are just a conduit to ensure the monies reach the clubs. We hope they use this money to put back into the younger ladies so we can continue producing high quality players to participate,” Wint added.