New
Coaching Crew For Lone Star
By Julu M. Johnson, Jr.
The Liberian national team Lone Star now has a new coaching team.
Wilfred Tijani Lardner heads the team appointed by the Ministry of
Youth and Sports.
Navaro Saykie, Director of Sports at the Sports Ministry and president
of the Coaches Association, is second to Lardner as deputy coach of
the Lone Star soccer squad.
It has been gathered that the new Lone Star chief tactician have not
entered into any contractual agreement given that they are both
employees of government. We will only run the team as civil servants,
Lardner stated.
Lardner and crew are in charge of the Lone Star only for the balance
five matches the team has to cover in the joint 2006 African Nations
and World Cup qualifiers. Liberia is second to bottom in Group One
with four points from five matches.
Lardner succeeds Kadallah Kromah who stepped down last year after the
Lone Star lost 3-0 against Senegal s Lions of Teranga in Monrovia. The
aftermath of the defeat led to the damaging of Kromah s Sinkor
residence and the manhandling of his aged mother by angry fans. An
entertainment center belonging to Liberian FA president Counsellor
Sombo Izetta Wesley was looted and her vehicle set ablaze.
The LFA later named Kromah s deputy, Joseph Sayon alias Kofi Bruce, as
caretaker, but the appointment was turned down by the Sports Ministry
on grounds that it was never consulted.
Recently, the Sports Minister held an audience with soccer coaches, at
which time the names of Lardner and Frank Jerico Nagbe emerged for the
post of head coach and deputy respectively.
However, not long after, Jerico rejected any attempt to make him
deputy coach of the Lone Star.
Considering several coaching awards he has won, Jerico believed he was
only fit to become the Lone Star head coach. Apparently, based upon
Jericho s objection, the Sports Ministry selected to replace him with
Navaro Saykie.
Lardner, the new Lone Star head coach, is having second spell at the
helm of the national team. He previously served as deputy coach under
the Late Walter Pelham during and in post war Liberia. He later took
over the national team as head coach, leading the squad to its first
African Nations Cup finals at South Africa 96.
Whether Lardner is capable of salvaging his nation s pride by
qualifying the Lone Star for at least the 2006 African Nations Cup
finals in Egypt is the major question now lying on his desk.
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