Norman Manley High School’s Manning Cup football coach Jahmoy Green says with greater assistance from past students they can once again be the force they once were.
Green, who represented the Maxfield Avenue-based school from 2013-2015, said the three-time Manning Cup winners and two-time Olivier Shield champions do not get the type of support of former years, and that if they were to get that type of support it would be a great motivation to the players.
He pointed also that local football has grown to new levels and that it is difficult for one coach to perform all tasks, and for the school to incur all expenses.
“We need a full backroom staff to compete with the best teams. We need the old boys to come in and put in their part. You know how most of the bigger schools do it, so it just can’t be the school alone. We need the old boys’ body to be there for the youths,” he said.
Recently, an old boy and former player in Damion Powell, who also represented Waterhouse FC, and other past students donated $350,000 to assist the school’s sports programme.
Although Green welcomes such contributions, he pointed that it is not only financial support that they require, but is calling on past students to also play a mentorship role and give motivational talks to the youngsters.
“They need to come in and show their faces to the youth and try to motivate them. You know that these young players don’t get that much motivation like when I was playing,” he pointed out.
In their first game of the Manning Cup season, Green’s team fell 7-0 to St George’s College and he lamented how much things have changed since his days as a player.
“As a past student from Norman Manley, it’s the first I can remember us picking up 7-0. Normally, we would be giving those scores. But it’s really a young team, so we are looking forward to next year, not this year. We will keep on doing the work and hope that we can keep this crop of boys for next year,” he stated.
He added that the main objective for this season is to help the young players understand what the coaches want from them, and help them develop as a unit.
“It’s mostly young players we are playing with, players coming from the under-14s stepping up to the Manning Cup. So it’s a young team that we have and we are just trying to keep them together to prepare for next year. That is our aim,” he said.
“It was their first time (against St George’s) out there, so they will understand and get better. But for this year it’s just to let them understand their roles and functions and how to move the ball quicker. So we have to go back to the drawing board because we have a lot of work to put in.”
Norman Manley will face Papine High in one of eight Manning Cup games on today.
livingston.scott@gleanerjm.com