WITH Saint Lucia youth female football players now making strides at the international level, the Desruisseaux Football League is leaving no stone unturned in preparing its aspiring youth players within the community in their personal development on and off the playing surface.
Earlier this week saw DFL climax of the Summer Camp for 45 young female footballers, held at two facilities, the Desruisseaux Community Centre and the Desruisseaux playing field.
Newly appointed female football coordinator for the DFL, Karissa Bellas, spoke to the VOICE about how it all started for her as football Coordinator and the various programmes presented to the young players.
“First of all, I was scared, it was my first time taking up such a challenge, but then I decided to take it on and try to develop something that will put Desruisseaux female football on the map instead of going out to look for players from the other communities”.
During the month of July, Bellas decided to come up with a programme entitled “Wetting the Root” for females between the ages of 7-19 years. She said, “I was still a bit sceptical as to how many girls will actually show up for such a programme because it was strictly about football. I also incorporated two foreign languages”.
She continued, “When the female footballers go out to represent Saint Lucia sometimes they are required to do an interview and most times they are nervous. The present cadre of players; I wanted them to develop that oral component and also having them develop self-esteem”.
On day 1 of the programme, 20 young ladies attended, and from there, as the good news spread throughout the community the total went up to 45 individuals up until the end of the programme.
Throughout the programme, the young ladies had basic football drills, rules of the game, player’s equipment. The various sessions were conducted by DFL in-house certified coaches, headed by Barry Justin, who had alongside him Shem Felix, Xavier Maximin, Innocent St. Ange, Cathleen Donnelly and firstaiderFilierMoncherry.
Bellas said, “We also taught them two foreign languages (French/Spanish) for 1 hour. We had Sherline Regis (French Teacher) and Michela Flavius (Spanish Teacher) both from the Micoud Secondary School”.
It’s a first timer for DFL and Bellas is satisfied with the overall outcome. “The young ladies turned up in their numbers and the interest is there. With the female under-15 tournament scheduled for December, the plan is to keep the older girls in training”. She noted.
Another area DFL will be looking at is to have weekend camps, so we can have control as to what they eat (diet), the length of time they sleep, because the coach will want to wake them up at a certain time for an early morning training, the whole idea is to develope an individual who is willing and who is capable of playing football very well. Education and sports go hand in hand”.
Bellas said, “DFL’s goal is to keep all of these young ladies together, they are our resources, Saint Lucia. We want to develop something good for the community”.
In closing she took the time out to make a special plea to Corporate Saint Lucia to lend their support towards this all-important initiative. “We sent a few letters for assistance and the response was not encouraging at all, I simply hope someone seeing this in the VOICE or simply hearing about it will get in touch with us at the soonest”. She asserted.
