GFA 'not doing enough' for youth

FORMER Muratti player Carl Le Tissier has slammed the Guernsey Football Association over their youth development of the sport. 'I feel we're not doing enough for the kids. It seems that other sports have overtaken football.

'My kids are more interested in cricket and badminton and for a Le Tissier that is quite disappointing. I'm worried about the kids' future.

His comments come after his Vale Rec Youth Three side played Rovers in the Le Vallee Cup final.

Le Tissier is the assistant coach for the Rec side and he was disappointed that the island's development officer, Chris Pringle, was not present at the match.

'He can answer that: perhaps he was away, but he should have been there,' he said.

Le Tissier says his son, Glen, is simply not playing enough football after the GFA's implementation of English FA rules limiting the number of matches that a child can play in a season.

'My two kids are going backwards because they are not playing enough football because of these new rules,' he said.

'That's not enough to develop kids. To me, if you're good enough, you're old enough to play more.

'And if they play against better players, then they will develop better.'

Another worry is that there seems to be a growing trend in Youth One of teams not being able to fulfil fixtures.

On Monday, league leaders North were due to play Rangers but the latter were unable to field an XI.

It was the same case with North's match with St Martin's on Thursday when Saints also could not raise a team. The fixtures secretary, Gary Cortez, believes this has to do with the time of the year, but he does think there are issues in Youth One.

'It's Christmas time and schools have got a lot more things going on,' he said.

Continued from page 44

'It's not a problem in Youth Two or Three but there are more college and Grammar boys playing now and they seem to be doing more things at school. I don't think there's a lack of numbers, there's just so much more going on at this time of year.

'It needs to be addressed. Maybe we should knock the week before Christmas on the head in the future.

'But there has been a problem in Youth One and I don't know what is going on. I've listened to some of the coaches and they are struggling to get sides out.'

St Martin's president Henry Davey has confirmed that they have had problems in getting out a side at Youth One level.

He says that Thursday's cancellation was due to some of his team working in shops in Town during late night shopping.

'It's players' commitments outside football that is the big issue,' said Davey.

'And the problem is going to get worse rather than better. For next year, I believe you've got to be 16 years old to play in the Youth One.

'It will cause a lot of problems. You'll have a Youth One league, but it will probably have only five sides in it.

'If we keep all our Youth Two players, we won't have a problem, but if some of them give up with all their other outside commitments, we don't have a hope in hell.'

Davey believes that the GFA are going by the letter of the law in respect of the rules and regulations handed down by the FA and that this is causing problems for the development of the local game.

'I don't think there are enough players to go around,' he said.

'One of the problems is that people at the GFA go by what the book says. We've got to remember that we're not even the size of a small town in the UK but we're being classified as a county.

'I foresee problems if we don't allow dispensations.'

Chris Schofield, the GFA's director for youth and development, is currently off the island.

He declined to comment on the points raised by Le Tissier but said the GFA currently had a 49-page development plan with the FA and that he would be prepared to discuss on his return, in full, the issues raised.