Nimba’s Sam Jackson and Bassa’s David Paye
FIFA 1995 World Player, George M. Weah, last Sunday expressed disappointment at the performance of Nimba County football team in the finals against Grand Bassa.
The Liberia Football Association last year, 2013, charged Ambassador Weah to identify potential players for the national soccer team, Lone Star.
He however commended Grand Bassa for a disciplined defense and effective midfield and a striking forward that earned them the victory.
He was full of praise for Bassa’s David Paye, for a wonderful job.
He meanwhile suggested a sample of players for the national team’s technical coach Thomas Kodjo, who was recently one of the scouts from the Ministry of Youths & Sports.
At the same time a horde of former Lone Star players and coaches, identified with tee-shirts in national colors were also present at the 2014 County Meet’s five venues to assist Ambassador Weah.
The coaches were Kaetu Smith, Lucretius Togba, Clarence Lee Chea, Joe Nagbe, and Janjay Jacobs, George Weah (not Amb. George M. Weah), Jonah Saweah, Nuku Goaneh, Oliver Markor, and Prince Daye.
The below lists of players (County Meet X1) were put together by the Daily Observer’s desk, after following keenly the preliminaries to the quarter finals, as well as the grand finals:
1. Sekou Bayou: the Bassa goalie, with jersey number 20 was very thoughtful between the sticks and made some excellent saves. The quarter and semi-finals against Bassa and Sinoe and Bong showed his ‘magic hands.’
2. Nicholas Swen: The diminutive right back of Nimba was awesome; his tackling, overlap and retreat, combined with his passes and throws made him ‘just right.’
3. Alex Bedell: the central defender of Nimba is burly with an iron will. His presence paid-off in all five undefeated games of Nimba County but Nimba’s final against Bassa was inarguably his weakness.
4. Jerry Wleh: The Grand Bassa skipper was impressive in the defense. He was aggressive and approached his game with effective communicative gestures as an inspiring leader.
5. Smith Kamara: Grand Cape Mount’s tall and nippy central defender deserves the status owing to his agility. Kamara, in my opinion was the best central defender of the tournament. He had superb skills in tackling and kicking. His overlap and passes created two goals for Cape Mount.
6 and 8. David Tweh and Ramson: The Bong and Bassa midfielders were ball distributors and controllers. Their presence in the middle of the park compelled forwarders to make in-roads.
7 and 11. Varney Sando and Sam Jackson: The duo could be coined as ‘Desperate Twin” when they blended. Jackson was crowned twice as the ‘Player of the Match’ for his skills and scoring abilities. Varney, the brave and dribbling player was the ‘Best Player of Bassa’ according to Coach David Doe.
10. This is hardly debatable between Nimba’s Prince Choppy and Grand Gedeh’s Lewis Yarpah, but Lewis’s hat-trick against Bong on Sunday made him the potent forwarder of the County Meet’s XI.
However, the coach for the above collection would be David Doe of Bassa for winning the trophy, and specifically for converting winger David Paye to a forwarder in the absence of the much-talk about Varney Sando.