The One Guyana President’s Cup football tournament will see, for the first time, players handsomely rewarded for each match played in the Regional stage.
Following the conclusion of the Inter-Ward fraction of the tournament, players will be selected for their respective Regional teams.
Apart from the $2M up for grabs for the winner, each player will pocket $80,000 per match. Team captain will receive $100,000. The head coach of each team will collect $100,000, while members of his coaching staff are to receive $80,000.
Each team advancing to the quarter-finals will pocket $200,000, and each semi-finalist will collect $400,000. The second place team will get $1M and third $500,000.
For the current Inter-Ward stage, cash prizes are awarded to the respective winners.
President of the Guyana Football Federation (GFF), Wayne Forde, highlighted, “With the huge committed incentives being offered by President Ali, I would like to encourage more young men to step forward and represent their community thus increasing their chances of making the final regional squad.”
“The One Guyana President’s Cup has opened up a new frontier in Community football. We are already seeing quality young players that we not part of the established football grid,” Forde said.
With the unprecedented investment from Government in the tournament, the Head-of-State is calling on the most important asset to his master plan – the players – to be fully committed.
With several entities known for supporting football, particularly during the festive season, President Ali is hoping to bring all of corporate Guyana under one umbrella for the President’s Cup.
He further stated, “This doesn’t take away the community football and the small goal football. That is an important part of community life and building up capacity.”
“But, here is where you have a serious national tournament that is geared at identifying a pool of national players that will go into an academy, that will have a three-year engagement to ensure that they’re doing the right thing, that they are disciplined, that they’re practising and having the right nutrition and they are having an opportunity to have a future after football.”
President Ali, before the kick-off of the tournament on November 12, said the idea is to use the ‘Beautiful Game’ as part of his Government’s plan to integrate sports into national life.
President Ali said the first-of-its-kind programme gives the Government of Guyana “an excellent platform which we can reach communities. We can reach disadvantaged people. We can reach young people. And football is an important sport for Guyana.”
“I’ve been around football, I’ve looked at football, and I think we have the capabilities and capacity to get to the World Cup. We will be using this brand to project football in a very positive direction, to launch a regional competition,” President Ali said.
President Ali also believes that football has an opportunity to bring people together, adding, “This is why, in conceptualising this tournament, I asked the guys to look at how we can bring every region on board, so it goes beyond clubs.”
