T&T Foot­ball As­so­ci­a­tion pres­i­dent Kieron Ed­wards has been ap­point­ed to a FI­FA De­vel­op­ment Com­mit­tee.

His ap­point­ment was made last week, and Ed­wards told Guardian Me­dia Sports that his goal is to move the sport for­ward. Ed­wards’ ap­point­ment comes months af­ter Con­ca­caf pres­i­dent Vic­tor Mon­tagliani paid a vis­it to T&T to en­gage with the T&T Foot­ball As­so­ci­a­tion’s (TTFA) lead­er­ship, of­fer­ing com­men­da­tions for the no­table ad­vance­ments un­der the stew­ard­ship of Ed­wards in June.

Con­tact­ed for a com­ment, Ed­wards was elat­ed by the ap­point­ment. “It’s one that I am ex­cit­ed to be able to con­tribute to the de­vel­op­ment of foot­ball, and it’s one that I am look­ing for­ward to mak­ing my mark and con­tin­u­ing to as­sist foot­ball and hav­ing a point of view from the Caribbean in terms of de­vel­op­ment of foot­ball world­wide.

“I am ex­cit­ed by the faith and con­fi­dence that FI­FA has placed in me to ap­point me to that com­mit­tee; it’s such an im­por­tant com­mit­tee for foot­ball. The last time, it was about 18 mem­bers on that com­mit­tee,” the lo­cal foot­ball boss ex­plained.

Ed­wards’ ap­point­ment can au­gur well for the Caribbean re­gion. Asked if he in­tends to use his ap­point­ment to lob­by for the re­gion, Ed­wards made it clear, “I am go­ing there to con­tribute, to give the best of my abil­i­ty, to lend sup­port, not just for the Caribbean, but the world, in terms of foot­ball and fur­ther de­vel­op the struc­ture that FI­FA would have put in place over the past cou­ple of years, as well as just to con­tin­ue that good work.”

Ed­wards and his team of vice pres­i­dents, Jame­son Rigues, Col­in Mur­ray, and Os­mond Down­er, as­sumed the lead­er­ship of the foot­ball as­so­ci­a­tion in 2020, fol­low­ing the ex­it of a FI­FA-in­stalled Nor­mal­i­sa­tion Com­mit­tee, which was led by busi­ness­man Robert Hadad. In 2020, the Bu­reau of the FI­FA Coun­cil ap­point­ed a nor­mal­i­sa­tion com­mit­tee for the T&TFA in ac­cor­dance with art. 8 par. 2 of the FI­FA Statutes.

The de­ci­sion fol­lowed a FI­FA/Con­ca­caf fact-find­ing mis­sion to T&T to as­sess, to­geth­er with an in­de­pen­dent au­di­tor, the fi­nan­cial sit­u­a­tion of TTFA, which was then led by for­mer Sec­ondary Schools Foot­ball League pres­i­dent William Wal­lace. The mis­sion found ex­treme­ly low over­all fi­nan­cial man­age­ment meth­ods, com­bined with a mas­sive debt, that re­sult­ed in the TTFA fac­ing a very re­al risk of in­sol­ven­cy and illiq­uid­i­ty.

Ed­wards’ en­try in­to the sport’s lead­er­ship came cour­tesy of a 38-19 vote for his Team Pro­gres­sive group at an elec­tion in 2024.

Ed­wards has main­tained that his in­ten­tion is to im­prove the sport. On Sun­day, he told Guardian Me­dia Sports fol­low­ing his ap­point­ment, he wants to en­sure that the way he met the sport of foot­ball, they could move it for­ward. “I’m just about mov­ing foot­ball for­ward, and if most peo­ple op­er­ate in that vein, it will on­ly help foot­ball im­prove,” Ed­wards said.