Vic­to­ri­ous head coach of the Trinidad and To­ba­go Red Force crick­et team, Rayad Em­rit, has urged the Ur­ban De­vel­op­ment Cor­po­ra­tion of Trinidad and To­ba­go (UDe­COTT) to grant ac­cess to fa­cil­i­ties at the Bri­an Lara Crick­et Acad­e­my for train­ing and prepa­ra­tion of the se­nior na­tion­al team.

Speak­ing at the team’s wel­come re­cep­tion in the VIP Lounge of the Pi­ar­co In­ter­na­tion­al Air­port on Thurs­day af­ter­noon, Em­rit said that use of the coun­try’s newest crick­et fa­cil­i­ty would great­ly aid in the prepa­ra­tion of all na­tion­al teams, and the se­nior team in par­tic­u­lar.

“Peo­ple might not like what I have to say, but I have to say it. UDe­COTT, please al­low us to use the Bri­an Lara fa­cil­i­ty. It’s a sport­ing fa­cil­i­ty. We need that fa­cil­i­ty if we re­al­ly want the team to be the pro­fes­sion­al team that you want us to be,” Em­rit stat­ed.

“We have our home of crick­et at the Na­tion­al Crick­et Cen­tre, where every sin­gle team in the coun­try – un­der 13s, un­der 15s, un­der 17s, un­der 19s, un­der 23s some­times, and the se­nior team – has to use three pitch­es. We have two in­door fa­cil­i­ties. So, five or six teams have to share the en­tire cen­tre,” he ex­plained. “A lot of peo­ple won’t un­der­stand what these guys go through day in, day out. These guys here, they work hard; they train hard. We want to do more when we leave the cen­tre, but we’re cramped and can on­ly use so much space. These guys could do bet­ter.

The for­mer play­er-turned head coach ex­pressed grat­i­tude to his pre­de­ces­sor, David Fur­longe, and the Queen’s Park Crick­et Club, who he said have al­ways stood ready to make them­selves avail­able to fa­cil­i­tate the team.

For­mer T&T Red Force head coach Fur­longe was on hand to wel­come the team home from An­tigua on Thurs­day. The for­mer Trinidad and To­ba­go wick­et­keep­er served as head coach from 2020 to 2025, lead­ing the Red Force to two re­gion­al 50-over ti­tles (2021 & 2023). How­ev­er, he was nev­er able to achieve four-day glo­ry with on­ly a best-ever fin­ish of third in 2022 to his cred­it.

Still, he was hap­py to see his pro­tege, Em­rit, car­ry the team over the line.

“I feel re­al­ly elat­ed. This is not an easy ti­tle to win. It’s been years in com­ing, and the fel­las have worked hard. If you look back, prob­a­bly four, five, maybe sev­en or eight years now, the same bunch of play­ers have been grow­ing. It’s good to see them now ma­ture and get the ti­tle.”

The coach­ing staff al­so came in for com­men­da­tion from Fur­longe, who said, “Rayad came in a cou­ple of years ago as an as­sis­tant coach, and I think he start­ed to do an ex­cel­lent job. He start­ed to help build his eye, and I think it was an easy tran­si­tion over to Rayad. He has con­tin­ued; he has built a good group; he has had dif­fer­ent team-build­ing ses­sions, and so on, and I think all that paid off.”

Fur­longe added, “His ex­pe­ri­ence, I think, is what re­al­ly got them there, you know. Rayad has played at that lev­el, so with him lead­ing it, and of course with Gibran there al­so, an ex­pe­ri­enced play­er, I think the group that we have there now is young, and hope­ful­ly they’ll be there for an­oth­er few years and bring more suc­cess.”

The 2026 West In­dies Cham­pi­onship is the sec­ond such ti­tle won by Em­rit, whose first was as a play­er in the 2006 team.

Em­rit, who de­buted for T&T in 2004 and last rep­re­sent­ed at the first-class lev­el in 2017, has since moved seam­less­ly in­to coach­ing, break­ing T&T’s two-decade ti­tle drought in his first full sea­son.

The for­mer medi­um pac­er said, “A few years ago, I was a part of the team, one of the coach­es learn­ing un­der the great lead­er­ship of Mr Fur­longe.” I asked him to be a part of the group. I want­ed to get in­to coach­ing and just come around, and he had no is­sues. A few months lat­er, the op­por­tu­ni­ty came for an as­sis­tant coach, and my name was put for­ward. And a few months af­ter that, Mr Fur­longe hand­ed over the (head coach) man­tle to me, and here I am with this tal­ent­ed bunch of guys.”

Af­ter Fur­longe re­signed from the job in Feb­ru­ary 2025, two days in­to the 2024-25 four-day sea­son, Em­rit took charge of the team’s next six match­es and amassed a record of three wins, one loss, and two draws as the Red Force fin­ished third on the stand­ings be­hind even­tu­al win­ners Guyana and run­ners-up Bar­ba­dos.

“We had the ti­tle in our hands, but then our two main bowlers, An­der­son Phillip and Jay­den Seales, had to leave to go to Eng­land, and we missed out. We got de­feat­ed by the last-place team and came third. This year, for­tu­nate­ly, at the be­gin­ning of the sea­son, we un­der­stood that we would have An­der­son and Jay­den for the en­tire se­ries, and you could see a dif­fer­ence in the team. For this team to lift this ti­tle af­ter 20 years, it’s so pleas­ing.”

Em­rit, 45, said he hopes to build on T&T’s for­tunes and stat­ed that his in­ten­tion is not on­ly to con­tin­ue win­ning but al­so to pro­duce Trinidad and To­ba­go play­ers who can stand the test of in­ter­na­tion­al crick­et.

“Hope­ful­ly, we can con­tin­ue this trend and won’t have to wait an­oth­er 20 years. For me, we just want to change the cul­ture. It’s go­ing to be tough, and a lot of peo­ple won’t agree with what we are do­ing. And that’s fine. If you don’t agree, you don’t have to be around Trinidad and To­ba­go crick­et. But that’s just how it’s go­ing to be mov­ing for­ward. We might win or we might not, but as long as the cul­ture changes and we get to pro­duce in­ter­na­tion­al crick­eters, I’m hap­py.”