JFF extends olive branch to suspended players
Published:Sunday | October 22, 2023 | 12:11 AMOrane Buchanan - Staff Reporter
IN THREE days’ time, a new-look Reggae Girlz team will take the field against Panama at the Universidad Latina in Gold Cup qualification amid mounting off-field issues between the Jamaica Football Federation (JFF) and players.
Just yesterday, the Reggae Girlz unit, which made it to the World Cup round of 16, published a letter revealing the issues that prompted an en bloc rejection of an invitation to turn out for two qualification games on Tuesday and again on the 29th against Guatemala.
However, speaking with The Sunday Gleaner, Dennis Chung, general secretary of the JFF, is hoping that a meeting between the parties involved will help solve the issues and hopes the current impasse doesn’t strain the relationship further.
“From our (JFF) end, what we’ve written to them (players) to say is that we would welcome a meeting to resolve the issues. It was getting out of hand how it was being dealt with publicly and FIFA rules states that if you’re not available you have to communicate that in a certain way,” said Chung.
The Reggae Girlz letter to the JFF said the team received “information about our coaching staff, medical staff, and equipment staff in an untimely manner and through unprofessional communication”.
According to the letter, the Reggae Girlz were peeved about only learning about the appointment of Xavier Gilbert to the post of head coach just three days before the team was scheduled to report for duty, and that the information came through social media, rather than official channels.
According to Chung, some players also wanted to know what type of travel arrangements were in place for them. But, Chung contends that travel arrangements would not normally have been revealed before the JFF was aware of who was available.
“One issue they had is that they wanted to know the names of all the support staff that is there. We said that we will make a listing of the staff, if we know their availability, which is reasonable. If you’re saying that you’re not going to play based on who is on the staff, then it seems as if you would want to pick the staff. Another issue would be the travel arrangement and I pointed out that the travel arrangements would be done based on contracts and the contract states that based on the time of travel, what arrangements you would get,” Chung disclosed.
Of the 23 players called to the squad, only six have represented the national team at the senior level before in Chriss-Ann Chambers, Malikae Dayes, Alika Keane, Jayda Hylton-Pelaia, and the pair of Chinyelu Asher and Marlo Sweatman, who were part of the Reggae Girlz squad at the 2019 World Cup in France.
Chung revealed that about five of the players who turned down the invitation to represent the country are collegiate players who stated that they had school obligations.
The JFF had also voiced concerns that a meeting scheduled for Friday with the players’ representatives did not happen, but Chung has since said those representatives indicated they received an invitation too late.
“There are about five of them who are college players who came to us and said they had school commitments and that’s a reason that is allowed under the FIFA rules. If you have players just making themselves unavailable, then can you imagine what would happen to world football? We (myself, Rudolph Speid, Elaine Walker-Brown) were all on call on Friday waiting, and then we got a response after to say that they (players’ representatives) got the information late and that’s why they couldn’t make the meeting.”