PORT OF SPAIN, Trinidad, CMC – Newly appointed Trinidad and Tobago head coach, Tom Saintfiet, says his immediate focus will be on results, not style, as he tries to rescue the country’s fading World Cup dreams and haul them into the CONCACAF Gold Cup.
The 43-year-old Belgian was Wednesday appointed to the post left vacant by last month’s sacking of Stephen Hart, and said winning upcoming Caribbean Football Union qualifiers against Suriname and Haiti would be top priority.
“You may not expect from me that I will ask for tikka takka football. I am not coach of Barcelona, I am coaching a country who at the moment is not getting the results as expected so my first aim is to get balance in the team, to get results oriented,” he told a media throng here.
. “We cannot always be attractive during a match but I prefer to laugh after the match when we have three points, that’s the first aim.
“At the moment we have to get to that level where we start winning matches … then I believe also we have the quality to start playing good, nice football but this must not be the priority at the moment.”
Sainfiet takes over a Trinidad side currently struggling for form. They missed out on qualification for the Caribbean Cup finals and by extension, automatic qualification for the 2017 CONCACAF Gold Cup.
T&T also lost the two opening games of the CONCACAF World Cup qualifying final round last month when they went down 2-0 to Costa Rica and 3-1 to Honduras.
First up for the twin-island republic will be Caribbean Football Union playoff against Suriname and Haiti next month, with the winner getting a chance to meet the qualifier from Central America, for a spot in the Gold Cup.
Sainfiet said Trinidad possessed quality players but tactical changes needed to be made in order to halt the losing slide.
“I think there is a lot of quality. There are a lot of good players, young players but also a lot of experienced players – players who play in the local league, the CONCACAF region and who play in Europe – so it’s a quite diverse, mixed group,” he pointed out.
“On the other side, you lost the game [against Honduras] 3-1 and two preparation games this season so you lose a lot of games, so there must be some things going wrong.
“Now it’s on me to find out [if there are] better players available but I have seen already some tactical approaches I would like to change and I believe first of all, looking to Suriname and Haiti … we have to use the coming few weeks as a training camp to shape a team to play in a tactical discipline.”
