‘Here’s to a safe 2021!’ - Sports administrators on their hopes and objectives for the new year

“As minister of sport, I am looking forward to a resumption of sporting activities.

“I know that our sportsmen and women are anxious to get back to normality, and I am also aware that there is a lot of anxiety and disappointment for the fans as well.

“In the meantime, the ministry continues to give financial and emotional support to our sportsmen and sportswomen as well as our sports’ governing bodies. We have provided some funding to assist during these most difficult times and will continue to work to keep hope alive for our athletes and sports enthusiasts.

“We know the nature of pandemics. They affect the whole world.

“I am encouraging all sporting bodies to review their business processes to determine how they can reintroduce sports in a safe way.

“We have no idea when the conditions will change to enable us to resume normality in sports, but we hope that it won’t be too long into the new year.”

– Sport Minister Olivia Grange

“The Jamaica Cricket Association (JCA) looks forward to the year 2021 with great optimism and hope. We are optimistic that the coronavirus will be controlled given that vaccines are now available and will soon be distributed in the region.

“For 2021, the JCA will continue with its development plans and programmes while we seek to play a few competitions, especially towards the end of the year. We are also hoping to host a few Cricket West Indies international tours to the Caribbean.

“So we will continue to have our players fit and match-ready, albeit in a limited way, especially at the start of the year. So while we anticipate that there will be challenges in 2021 associated with COVID-19, we do expect to have more space to reintroduce cricket at some levels of the game.”

– JCA President Wilford Heaven

“My plans are for the smooth and safe restart of the athletic calendar. I am wishing all track and field lovers a prosperous and happy new year.”

– Jamaica Athletics Administrative Association President Garth Gayle

“Aquatics really had a setback with the pandemic. Fortunately for us, we put all our ducks in a row, and we were able to reopen our National Aquatics Centre. What that does now is gives us a good springboard to 2021. A lot of regional championships have indicated that they are going to go ahead. [So] the 2021 programme looks positive for us international and regionally.

“In terms of locally, we intend to have sessions so we can sort out any protocols that need to be sorted out towards having club meets earlier rather than later. So that will be our plan for 2021.”

– Aquatic Sports Association of Jamaica President Martin Lyn

“We want to say to the nation that we have gained great experience from 2020 in terms of operating in a pandemic. So it has taught us a lot of lessons, and so now, we are preparing ourselves going into 2021 to make sure [that we are] successful in our endeavours that we will encounter. We have the Gold Cup, we have the [men’s] World Cup qualifiers, and we have youth football. We are preparing ourselves to make sure that we perform well in these tournaments so we can ultimately qualify for the World Cup, and if possible, win the Gold Cup.

“[Also,] nothing that we do, we ever consider leaving our ladies [senior women’s team] behind. They are beside us, and we hold hands together and go into 2021 performing at our optimum and ensuring that support is given to the women’s programme for ultimate success.”

– Jamaica Football Federation General Secretary Dalton Wint

“For 2021, I am hoping that the negatives that would have transpired during 2020 will go away. Hopefully, we will be able to see the back of COVID-19 and sports can resume to some semblance of normalcy.

“For ISSA, we are hoping that for 2021, we will be able to see the benefits of having that long lay-off where we would’ve been able to reflect on some of the things we are doing, and where we can improve in terms of our offering to school sports. So I would want to see us more involved in the promotion of so-called ‘minor sports’ and to see those sporting competitions grow a lot more in 2021.”

– ISSA President Keith Wellington