Citing the inactivity of players due to the nonexistence of local football, Travis Bess, head coach of West Demerara giant Pouderoyen FC, says the ongoing Summer Transfer Window should not have taken place because of the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic.
This was disclosed by Bess, 34, during an exclusive interview with Stabroek Sport yesterday.
According to Bess, “The 2020 Summer Transfer Window should have never occurred in my opinion because we have inactive players. And by being inactive, the players can’t showcase their talents to be possibly selected or signed by bigger clubs. The GFF shouldn’t have allowed the transfer window to happen. They should have frozen everything until the Covid-19 situation ends and then have an emergency window when things normalize for clubs to transfer players. Failing to do that puts us in the situation where we are in currently, Pouderoyen isn’t going to select and transfer players now, and it makes no sense.”
Bess, who during his playing career was capped 10 times for the Beach Football Programme and twice for the Futsal National Team, revealed that coaches and scouts, the individuals who are often responsible for the acquisition of new players, are unable to analyze potential targets due to the lack of football owing to the Covid-19 climate.
He stated that the transfer of any player during this period will be based entirely on the respective reputation and previous performances of the individual player. “The reason being is that we have inactive players, and coaches and scouts can’t look at players to recruit them for the various clubs because of the lack of football. Coaches will have to select players based on their previous name and reputations,” he said.
“Presently if a club wants to sign a player, they are going to sign him based on the individual’s past reputation and not on current form so we should have never allowed this window to occur and make it mandatory in January 2021 that we have a two month window period instead of one,” he added.
According to Bess, he was unaware that the two-month Summer Transfer Window actually commenced on June 1.
“Personally I didn’t even know the window was active until I saw a story of several high profile players moving to the Police. Based on what was happening especially in Europe, I felt that every country would have pushed back their window as well. Now it seems the window is almost closed after starting in June, it’s just not profitable at the moment because you might incur a financial cost in transferring players with no returns. In the January window we brought in 12 players and they have not played much football. We have not trained much because of the Covid-19 situation.”
Based on the official FIFA Worldwide Registration Periods Calendar, Guyana’s first transfer window will occur from June 1st 2020-July 31st 2020. This applies to all three aspects of the Season which are the Men, Women and Amateur categories. Meanwhile, the second transfer or registration date will ensue from January 1st 2021-January 31st 2021. This also relates to all three categories.
He opined that an approach akin to the European model should have been taken locally in the transfer period.
“For countries especially those in Europe who have resumed competitive football, we have seen that they have shifted their transfer window to accommodate players and clubs. This is business and they won’t purchase players if they don’t see them in action. In Europe they are effectively going to start the transfer window after the end of the league season.”
Bess disclosed that his club will not solicit the services of players during this period, as they are unable to analyze the quality of prospective targets. He disclosed, “One of the reasons Pouderoyen FC is inactive during this window which has always been our powerful player recruitment period, is because we cannot scout players and don’t know what they can bring or how they can improve the team. It doesn’t make sense bringing an unknown element to the team and it might not suit the style of the club.”
Bess contended that the normal transfer of players during the current climate is counterproductive as there is no timeline for the resumption of the sport. He declared, “Personally, it would look very bad because we have had two transfer windows where we transferred inactive players. I don’t see that making sense because there is no timeline for the end of the current situation. We are hoping that it ends but what happens if football doesn’t resume for the year.”
