The desire and commitment to have international cricket tournaments, such as the Caribbean Premier League (CPL) and the current ICC Under-19 Cricket World Cup are being called for to have local sports back in action.
Brent Sancho, a man of many caps, being a former Minister of Sports, Chairman of the T&T Pro League and club owner believes there is an inconsistency taking place that is preventing many sportsmen and women from, not only playing the sport of their choice but also preventing them from earning a living.
Minister of Sports and Community Development Shamfa Cudjoe is said to be working feverishly to ensure that contact sports get back on the field.
In December last year, a proposal outlining the approach to return to contact sport this year (2022) was delivered to the Ministry of Health and its line minister Terrance Deyalsingh.
Cudjoe told Guardian Media Sports the proposal seem to have met the approval of the minister and his principal medical officer and she was now awaiting an official response. However, Sancho, while applauding the efforts of the minister, said she is moving two years too late.
" I think they've been inconsistent in their approach. Remember T&T was the only Caribbean island to host a major sporting event when there were no vaccines and there was still a lot of figuring out as it relates to the pandemic, this was the CPL tournament.
There would have been a significant amount of desire, a significant amount of want by the persons in charge, whether it be the ministry of health, ministry of sports and by extension the government to put together the CPL.
They would have sat with stakeholders to ensure that every 'I' was dotted and 'T' was crossed. Similarly, the same situation here now with the Under-19 cricket tournament, and again a significant amount of will, so the question I am asking is where is that will for local sports to resume.
Where is that will for the restart of contact sports with football, for the restart of contact sports with volleyball and basketball, etc.
Remember this is an island and a government that turned down World Cup qualifiers (between T&T vs Guyana in March last year) because they didn't want to allow unvaccinated persons on the island to play the sport, but here is it, you have a cricket tournament being played with both vaccinated and unvaccinated," Sancho said.
The dreadlocks former T&T defender believes lack of consultation between the government, through its sports minister and the people on the ground, has prevented what action from taking place, noting that only in T&T there has been no football.
" Until we have an actual and factual document from the ministry of sports, and I think that is where the problem is. Sit down with the stakeholders, explore the various avenues and have the same determination that they're having to host these tournaments to make sure that it can come to fruition.
If you recall, many of the proposals that have been sent on various leagues, various sports, were met with absolute silence on one hand and in some cases have been completely rebutted.
At the end of the day, have the same want that you had to host the CPL when nobody else in the Caribbean wanted to host any sporting tournaments, as well as the same determination you have to host the under-19 cricket tournament and just put some of that into local sports."
Sancho concluded: " It has been well documented that whatever is used in the English Premier League may not work in Trinidad and Tobago, or the La Liga or the MLS, may not work in Trinidad and Tobago and vice versa, because what is clear is that varying sporting organisation have varying approaches towards how they deal with sports in the pandemic, we've seen that.
The pandemic itself is an evolving situation, so unless you have those types of conversations you wouldn't know how to go forward. For instance, look at Jamaica and Guyana, they've had football tournaments, they've played league games, they've had football of some sort, but what is the dominating factor is dialogue, a desire by all parties to want sports to play."
Sancho is challenging anyone to look around the world and find a league that has been dormant for two years.