The saga continues in the "school vs country" row involving the national players representing their schools in the Secondary Schools Football League which kicks off on Thursday. Now national senior football team coach Mr. Wim Rijsbergen is going to get involved, and is scheduled to meet with SSFL officials to discuss this heated topic.

Mr. Rijsbergen stated emphatically,"There should only be one interest" and has made it no secret that he supports the stance taken by national youth team coach Anton Corneal. Coach Corneal controversially stated that he was considering withdrawing all national players from the SSFL in order to ensure his team has the best possible chance of qualifying for the 2007 Fifa Under-17 World Cup in April 2007. The "big bad wolf" (according to Mr. Corneal) that is the SSFL, will serve only to regress the work started by the national youth team.

SSFL secretary Mr. Azaad Khan does not share this opinion, and is insistent that there is sufficient time between the end of the SSFL in October and the World Cup Qualifiers in April to prepare the national youth team. Mr. Khan went as far as to draw reference to FIFA rules which allow countries to withdraw its players from domestic competition five days prior to the match.

National senior team coach Mr. Rijsbergen believes that this issue can and should be dealt with in a constructive manner and urged all involved to put the good of Trinidad and Tobago foremost in their minds. Mr. Rijsbergen is a former Dutch World Cup player and stated that in the Netherlands, it was the norm for young players to practice before school on mornings and then after school in the evenings. As such he cannot understand how national duty could be perceived as distracting for school students.

"We have to sit down and make a plan with the schools, we cannot have a situation where we are bad talking schools and the schools are bad talking the national sessions."