MLF is ideal, says Best

Clyde Best has thrown his support behind the Caribbean’s new Major League Football tournament, which is due to start in 2015.

Initial plans are for the season to last nine months between September and June and for it to be played in four yet-to-be-selected countries (or hubs), in  groups of five clubs per hub. There is also championship playoffs and an All-Star game slated.

Bermuda legend Best, who blazed a trail for black footballers in England during a hugely-successful spell at West Ham in the 1960s and 1970s.

He believes a Caribbean league will be the ideal place to develop its players.

“We as Caribbean players always had to work much harder to prove ourselves in order to hold our positions,” he said in a press release.

“Most of the international coaches never really understood our style of play, nor the positions where we would be most effective to the system they chose to play. 

“As a result, some of us did not perform as well as was expected and were ultimately cut from our teams at some point in time thereafter.

“I feel very confident that if most of our younger talent can stay on home soil in the Caribbean, utilizing the development available within the MLF youth structure and eventually plying their trade with MLF clubs where training will be available from the most qualified coaches within the Caribbean and by extension the Latin American region, our players will develop much faster and be more effective. 

“The calibre of the head coaches within the CONCACAF region are ranked along the same lines as some international coaches. 

“They are definitely qualified and up to the task of transforming our players into world class performers. They understand the style of Caribbean players, much better than most, and possess the drive and determination needed to squeeze all of the natural talent out of these players.

“I see this combination of raw talented players with the coaching skills offered through the MLF, as a union that would produce more players displaying the skills of a Dwight Yorke, Russell Latapy, Kenwyne Jones, Theodore Whitmore, or Shaka Hislop.”