There is a cer­tain elec­tric­i­ty that hov­ers over a coun­try when a big sport­ing oc­ca­sion is around the cor­ner. You can feel it be­fore you even step in­to the sta­di­um. The chat­ter in bar­ber­shops and bars, the ar­gu­ments, the posts cir­cu­lat­ing on What­sApp groups—they all re­volve around one thing: the match.

On the eve of a Caribbean Pre­mier League T20 clash, you would sense the vibe build­ing, ven­dors stock­pil­ing cool­ers, flags, and horns. The rhythm of the na­tion shifts. But when it’s foot­ball —es­pe­cial­ly a World Cup qual­i­fi­er —the weight is heav­ier, the stakes big­ger. A CPL tro­phy is pride, en­ter­tain­ment, and a par­ty. A World Cup berth is his­to­ry, val­i­da­tion, and glob­al rel­e­vance.

At the Hase­ly Craw­ford Sta­di­um, the prepa­ra­tions tell their own sto­ry. The grounds­men pay close at­ten­tion to the greens. Se­cu­ri­ty and tick­et en­try teams map en­try points and check­lists. Staff fine-tune ac­cred­i­ta­tion sys­tems and test sound equip­ment be­cause come match night, there can be no glitch­es.

Pro­duc­tion crews test mi­cro­phones, cam­eras and light­ing. Vol­un­teers are shown the ropes.

Each step is rit­u­al. Each de­tail feels mag­ni­fied when nine­ty min­utes could tilt a na­tion’s mood.

The play­ers them­selves walk a del­i­cate line be­tween fo­cus and fren­zy. Kevin Moli­no and com­pa­ny scroll through mes­sages from fam­i­ly, sort­ing out those who are wait­ing on match tick­ets, some­times drown­ing out the noise with head­phones, but they know—the eyes of an en­tire coun­try will be on them.

Mes­sages from friends and fam­i­ly pour in—en­cour­age­ment, prayers, last-minute ad­vice.

The vet­er­ans have tast­ed both tri­umph and heart­break; the younger ones car­ry the rest­less en­er­gy of want­i­ng to etch their names in new his­to­ry.

Fans, too, are locked in­to prepa­ra­tion. Some plan out­fits in red, white, and black. Oth­ers or­gan­ise trans­port in con­voy. Food ven­dors bulk up sup­plies—pholourie, bake and shark, and corn soup—be­cause win or lose, the na­tion must eat. The buildup feels com­mu­nal, like one big line that stretch­es from east to west. The par­ty sec­tions and their crews be­gin count­ing down. The air on match day car­ries the thick­ness of both hope and ex­pec­ta­tion.

Else­where in the world, the rhythm is dif­fer­ent. Some coun­tries are al­ready safe­ly qual­i­fied for the 2026 World Cup—their con­ver­sa­tions aren’t about “if” but about “who will make the fi­nal squad.” Their prepa­ra­tion is sci­en­tif­ic, long-term, and metic­u­lous­ly re­sourced. Play­ers fly in on pri­vate jets, med­ical teams op­er­ate like mil­i­tary units, and com­mer­cial spon­sors em­bed them­selves in every touch­point. For them, qual­i­fi­ca­tion is an as­sump­tion. For us, it is an as­pi­ra­tion.

That con­trast forces the un­com­fort­able ques­tion: are we tru­ly se­ri­ous about reach­ing that lev­el, or do we just love the idea be­cause the pos­si­bil­i­ty ex­cites us? We rev­el in the hash­tags, the full stands, and the car­ni­val-like drums. But do we in­vest with the same in­ten­si­ty in the unglam­orous parts—in­fra­struc­ture, plan­ning, ac­count­abil­i­ty, sac­ri­fice?

Be­yond the eu­pho­ria, does our sys­tem, from grass­roots to gov­er­nance, re­flect a na­tion bent on qual­i­fy­ing for a World Cup — or one con­tent to ride the emo­tion­al high of al­mosts and maybes?

The night of Sep­tem­ber 5th will an­swer some ques­tions but not all. A vic­to­ry will stir pride, and a de­feat will sting. But the deep­er reck­on­ing lies in whether we as a foot­balling na­tion are build­ing for per­ma­nence or mere­ly liv­ing for the fleet­ing buzz.

Be­cause foot­ball is not just nine­ty min­utes un­der flood­lights. It is in­fra­struc­ture, plan­ning, ac­count­abil­i­ty, and sac­ri­fice. The coun­tries al­ready book­ing their tick­ets to 2026 un­der­stand that. Do we?