Jamaican-born England football legend, John Barnes (left), CONCACAF and CFU president Austin 'Jack' Warner and Kieran Foley (right), head of sponsorship at Digicel Group, stand together infront a table with the Digicel Caribbean Cup, at a press conference to announce Digicel Group's four-year extended sponsorship of the regional competition, at The Roosevelt hotel in Manhattan, New York, on Friday. - Contributed

Audley Boyd, Assistant Editor - Sport

MANHATTAN, New York:

The Caribbean Football Union (CFU) and telecommunications provider, Digicel Group, the sponsor of its flagship competition - the Digicel Caribbean Cup - signed a four-year deal on Friday afternoon at the Roosevelt Hotel in Manhattan, New York, to extend their association in staging the region's premier football tournament through to 2011.

No financial details were revealed.

The event's launch at the press conference, covered by a host of journalists associated with regional media and endorsed by Jamaican-born England football legend John Barnes, was organised to coincide with the start of the Confederations of North, Central American and Caribbean Associations of Football (CONCACAF) Gold Cup tournament, which is being staged across the United States.

Four Caribbean countries are participating, inclusive of Digicel Caribbean Cup champions Haiti, runners-up Trinidad and Tobago, Cuba and Guadeloupe which finished third and fourth respectively in the Digicel Caribbean Cup.

Jamaica not involved

Jamaica are not involved in the competition, which also involves the top Central American teams, because they were eliminated in the four-team Digicel Caribbean Cup group stage it hosted at the National Stadium in Kingston last year.

Recognising the contribution made by Digicel Group since they joined forces with the CFU in 2004, Austin 'Jack' Warner, president of both CONCACAF, which has

its headquarters in New York, and the Caribbean Football Union (C.F.U.), noted that "what we have is more than a sponsor, we have a partner".

He added: "Sport, and football, will never go forward unless there's support. In this regard, a partner like Digicel is imperative.

"For this thing to develop we need the expertise, the marketing skill, we need everything, to make this thing a success," Warner reinforced.

Beyond the boundaries

The outspoken Warner, who is also the president of the Confederations of North, Central American and Caribbean Associations of Football (CONCACAF), pointed out that Digicel's sponsorship went beyond the boundaries of the Caribbean competition as "they sponsor friendly matches for the Caribbean nations," urged other companies to get involved in football sponsorship and chastised regional governments for not taking greater responsibility in the developing the sport.

He said: "For too long the governments of the region believe that because Digicel is now the 'fairy godfather' then they must not contribute. Digicel is doing a lot but governments need to do their part."

The Trinidadian businessman, who is also a vice-president of the sport's world governing body, FIFA, further called 'shortsighted' the oft-utilised counter argument of this long-running issue that regional governments' use of limited resources to build hospitals and other types of infrastructure in the poor regional territories is more important.

"For people to make that type of argument is shortsighted. Theplayfields can make them more healthy."

He added: "The flags of the Caribbean countries will never be flown on the fields of war. The flags of the Caribbean countries will be flown on the field of sports."

Warner also listed several CFU initiatives to strengthen the game regionally.

"One of the things we're doing, and we've to do it consistently, is to develop our youth programmes, our youth football. We've to make sure that we're not sexist and spend some time and energy on women's football and we also have to address our referees" programme."

Kieran Foley, the head of sponsorship at Digicel Group, signed the contract with Warner and noted that they got involved because 'Digicel is a Caribbean company' and the people in this market are strong supporters of two sports - football and cricket - of which his company is a major sponsor through the West Indies team.

Foley added: "We've listened because that's what our customers want us to get involved in."

Commenting on their initial four-year deal, Foley noted: "Our ambitions were not matched, but surpassed.

Highest world ranking

"Over 320 million households witnessed Digicel Caribbean Cup coverage this year, every team jumped to their highest world ranking. We had St. Vincent and the Grenadines knocking out champions Jamaica, it was really David vs Goliath stuff."

He says their new commitment has "more components of sponsorship, more spectators and bigger prize money.

"We want to ensure that we've more group stages, more matches. We intend to make this an international stage of football. We know that the players and the talent

is there, we just want to get behind them," stated Foley.

Prize money in last year's championship amounted to US$270,000, with champions Haiti ripping out the lion's share of US$120,000. Trinidad and Tobago got US$70,000 for being runners-up, while US$80,000 was split unevenly for third (US$50,000) and fourth (US$30,000).

Commenting on Digicel's support, Barnes said: "As much as we have talent we needsupport. I'd like more people to get involved - I'd urge people to get involved.

"The most important thing is to be given an opportunity and Digicel is doing that."