Two new mem­bers have been added to the se­nior women’s foot­ball team ahead of the World Cup Qual­i­fiers start­ing in No­vem­ber.

Con­fir­ma­tion came yes­ter­day that for­mer na­tion­al mid­field­er Maylee At­tin-John­son has been re­cruit­ed as the team’s man­ag­er, and Dami­an Brig­gs, a T&T res­i­dent based in Eng­land, has been ap­point­ed as an as­sis­tant coach. Both are sched­uled to touch down on lo­cal soil on Mon­day, two days af­ter the of­fi­cial start of the team’s prepa­ra­tion.

T&T Foot­ball As­so­ci­a­tion pres­i­dent Kieron Ed­wards con­firmed the two ap­point­ments via a tele­phone in­ter­view, say­ing the coun­try can ex­pect some ex­cit­ing times for women’s foot­ball. At­tin-John­son is a for­mer women’s se­nior na­tion­al team cap­tain who has rep­re­sent­ed her coun­try at the se­nior in­ter­na­tion­al lev­el since the age of 15. She is the hold­er of a bach­e­lor’s de­gree in sports man­age­ment from Ken­ne­saw State Uni­ver­si­ty in Geor­gia, USA.

Brig­gs, on the oth­er hand, has over 10 years of coach­ing ex­pe­ri­ence, which in­cludes lead­ing pro­fes­sion­al acad­e­mies, Nor­wich City FC (cur­rent club), Charl­ton Ath­let­ic FC, Southend Unit­ed FC, and first-team coach­ing ex­pe­ri­ence with ex-pro­fes­sion­al Gary Alexan­der at Glebe FC. Dami­an is al­so a UE­FA A-li­censed coach and an Ad­vanced Youth Award qual­i­fi­er.

Their con­tracts will be for the du­ra­tion of the World Cup cam­paign. Ed­wards opened up about the ap­point­ments, call­ing it a grand part of a mas­sive over­haul­ing that’s go­ing to take place in women’s foot­ball. Head coach An­gus Eve and his as­sis­tant Den­sill Theobald are ex­pect­ed to have their first train­ing ses­sion this morn­ing at 10 am at the Lar­ry Gomes Sta­di­um in Mal­abar, Ari­ma.

The 2025–26 Con­ca­caf Women’s Qual­i­fiers will in­clude 29 Mem­ber As­so­ci­a­tions and take place dur­ing the FI­FA Women’s In­ter­na­tion­al Match Win­dows in No­vem­ber 2025 and Feb­ru­ary and April 2026.

For these qual­i­fiers, which will not in­clude the re­gion’s two top-ranked na­tions (they have re­ceived a bye to the W Cham­pi­onship), par­tic­i­pat­ing teams will be split in­to six groups for Group Stage play.

Dur­ing the Group Stage, each team will play two match­es at home and two away. At the con­clu­sion of this round, the six group win­ners will ad­vance to the Con­ca­caf W Cham­pi­onship.

T&T has been drawn in Group F along­side El Sal­vador, Hon­duras, and Bar­ba­dos. The oth­er groups are Group A: Mex­i­co, Puer­to Ri­co, Saint Lu­cia, Saint Vin­cent and the Grenadines, and the Unit­ed States Vir­gin Is­lands; Group B: Ja­maica, Guyana, Nicaragua, Do­mini­ca, and An­tigua and Bar­bu­da; Group C: Cos­ta Ri­ca, Guatemala, Bermu­da, Grena­da, and the Cay­man Is­lands; Group D: D: Haiti, the Do­mini­can Re­pub­lic, Suri­name, Be­lize, and An­guil­la; and Group E: Pana­ma, Cu­ba, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Cu­ra­cao, and Aru­ba.

Ed­wards, speak­ing on the de­ci­sion for a to­tal over­haul in women’s foot­ball, said, “As an ex­ec­u­tive, we would have had sev­er­al meet­ings with se­nior play­ers from the women’s team. We would have ba­si­cal­ly scrapped the se­nior women’s pro­gramme af­ter those dis­cus­sions, part­ing ways with our for­mer head coach at the time, Richard Hood, and we would have sat down as an ex­ec­u­tive with the tech­ni­cal com­mit­tee, with per­sons in foot­ball, in terms of chart­ing a new path­way for women’s foot­ball.”

“And this is just the start, in terms of the way we en­gage with the se­nior women’s team, and that will then move down in terms of all our na­tion­al teams and how we op­er­ate when it comes to the na­tion­al pro­gramme.”

He ex­plained fur­ther, “We have re­vamped our club pro­gramme as well, hav­ing dealt with WoLF (The Women’s Foot­ball League), in terms of hav­ing the first six-month-long league. Hav­ing now gone through Con­ca­caf com­pli­ance, next sea­son would mark a sig­nif­i­cant step with women’s foot­ball in T&T, where the win­ners of our league would qual­i­fy for the Women’s Club Cham­pi­onships in Con­ca­caf.So, that is a sig­nif­i­cant step in terms of where we go, so young girls com­ing up through the ranks can see a clear path­way in which they can play pro­fes­sion­al foot­ball and move for­ward in their ca­reers in foot­ball.”