RAYMOND GRAHAM, Commentary

This was undoubtedly the best ever Jamaica junior assembled and, in my opinion, they could easily have gotten at least 11 medals and finished second overall to the United States, equalling the previous best medal haul of 11 garnered by the team in 2002 when Jamaica hosted the Championships.

On that occasion there was a serious junior programme, put in place under the Pat Anderson-led JAAA executive, which placed a lot of emphasis on our juniors. Top junior athletes were identified after the Boys and Girls' Championships and invited to attend training camps at G.C.Foster College on weekends where they were supervised by most of the top coaches in the country.

It is no accident the likes of Usain Bolt, Jermaine Gonzales, Melaine Walker, Kerron Stewart and Sherone Simpson are doing well at the senior level, they were some of those who benefited under that programme, in which former JAAA executive member Brian Smith also played a very integral role.

Since Anderson left office, nothing has been done to get back that programme on track and despite present JAAA executive member Alfred Francis, who tries his best to maintain it, it seems he gets no support from the administration. As a result, the programme has been stalled with everything now thrown behind the senior programme. While the seniors need support, that should not been the case as our juniors are the future, and when the seniors move on the programme must continue. It is no surprise that over the past few championships at both World Youth and World Junior the results been in decline.

It must be noted that after the Boys and Girls' Championships, most of the schools are not interested in what happens to the athletes and on most occasions it is the high-school coaches that have to take on that burden. It should not be the case because the athletes are preparing for the national team and it is the duty of the JAAA to take up that responsibility to ensure the continuity of the programme.

Another big blunder made was sending members of the World Junior team to the Junior CAC Championships in El Salvador. The athletes suffered big time as they spent most of the time travelling instead of preparing for World Juniors. It was really difficult for them and the majority of them, on their arrival, had to travel the following day to Spain. What the administration should have done was to have kept these athletes at a training camp to fine-tune for the major championships. Was it that someone was trying to appease the region that made our athletes have to work overtime? Luckily, coach of gold medallist Janieve Russell, Maurice Wilson, asked for permission for his athlete to stay back and prepare in Jamaica and we all see the benefits of that. Perhaps if Russell had gone to El Salvador she would not have got a medal at the event.

In another four months it will be time to elect a new JAAA executive and whoever is elected to manage the affairs of the country's track-and-field programme, priority must be given to our junior programme. The executive should also ensure that they have a member of the coaching fraternity to give them the technical expertise, as too often the selection of athletes has been a sore point. Recently, we saw where the country's top Under-18 female sprint hurdler was not selected to go the championships. The new executive should get the ball rolling with next year's World Youth Championships getting priority.