Brown guarantees quality surface for Panama game

Independence Park Limited General Manager, Major Desmon Brown, says that the National Stadium playing surface will be of good quality for Jamaica’s World Cup qualifying home opener on Sunday.

The Reggae Boyz will face Panama at 5 p.m., as the National Stadium will host an international game for the first time in almost two years. October 13, 2019, was the last time Jamaica played a game at the ground known as ‘The Office’, when Jamaica recorded a 2-0 win over Aruba in the Concacaf Nations League.

That was before the COVID-19 pandemic brought a halt to sport the following year.

However, it has not been the long absence of an international game in Jamaica that has motivated Brown and his team in their preparations. His reasoning is simple, to ensure that it meets the required quality checks FIFA demands, which he says they have had more time to do since the hiatus.

“Our motivation is to make sure that FIFA is satisfied and to high standards,” Brown told The Gleaner. “I think with not having a game (in a while), we have had more time to get the field together. Also, we didn’t have as many track and field events because sometimes you throw shot put and all of that you can mess up the field. So I think we are in good stead to meet the requirements of FIFA.”

Brown says that initial checks were done by the Jamaica Football Federation (JFF) on the playing surface on Wednesday, with final adjustments to be made regarding where the media will be placed for the game.

“We are satisfied that everything is OK. We have a programme and a plan based on when the game is, to work on it. We cut, we rolled, we fertilised. So everything is going according to plan,” Brown said.

Meanwhile, Local Government Minister, Desmond McKenzie, says that there were not any difficulties in granting the JFF the necessary exemption for the match to take place on a no-movement day.

The strict COVID-19 measure which was supposed to end on Sunday has since been expanded for another two weeks to combat the surge of cases on the island.

McKenzie said that they were helped with the template already established for the return of the Jamaica Premier League.

“We met along with the JFF and Professional Football Jamaica Limited to work out a protocol in regard to the resumption of football. And the (JFF) just extended that protocol to facilitate the World Cup qualifiers. So there is a template and one of the main pillars of the template is it is a no-spectator game,” he said.

However, McKenzie was non-committal about the approval process for Jamaica’s next home game against Canada on October 10, instead wanting to get through tomorrow’s game first before discussing those plans.

daniel.wheeler@gleanerjm.com