Re­lieved by FI­FA's de­ci­sion to lift the sus­pen­sion on the T&T Foot­ball As­so­ci­a­tion (TTFA), Khaleem Hy­land, the T&T se­nior men’s team cap­tain is now an­tic­i­pat­ing a re­turn to lead­ing the na­tion­al team.

Hy­land, yes­ter­day, paid trib­ute to for­mer Ar­genti­na cap­tain Diego Maradona, while ob­serv­ing the pas­sion for the game in the South Amer­i­can coun­try which he wit­nessed when T&T faced the 1986 World Cham­pi­ons in an in­ter­na­tion­al friend­ly in Buenos Aires in 2014.

“I want to pay re­spect and ex­press con­do­lences to the fam­i­ly, friends and ex-team­mates of Diego Maradona. World foot­ball has lost a foot­balling God. It is a sad week for all of us. Every­one is griev­ing as he had a part to play in the lives of so many peo­ple re­gard­ing their love for the game. He was a dom­i­nant and in­spi­ra­tional fig­ure to mil­lions in­clud­ing my­self,” Hy­land said.

Re­flect­ing on his ex­pe­ri­ence on Ar­genti­na soil, the Sau­di Ara­bia-based play­er con­tin­ued, “It was so great to wit­ness in Ar­genti­na how they wor­shipped Maradona and Mes­si with so many bill­boards and posters across Buenos Aires. Their pas­sion for the game is im­mense and they al­ways want the best for their team and the coun­try.

"I hope one day I can live to see some­thing sim­i­lar in my coun­try. But of course, we as play­ers need to do our part and we as a coun­try have to re­al­ly put our heads to­geth­er to lift our­selves.

“Every­one needs to come on board and we need to start from now know­ing that the sus­pen­sion is lift­ed. The Nor­mal­i­sa­tion Com­mit­tee (NC) is in charge and every­one in­volved needs to give the NC the fullest sup­port and re­spect in or­der for us to do this for the coun­try, think­ing of the fu­ture gen­er­a­tions.”

The mid­field­er, who played in the UE­FA Cham­pi­ons League for Bel­gium club Rac­ing Genk, stressed the im­por­tance of stake­hold­ers putting the de­vel­op­ment of the lo­cal game above every­thing.

“It is im­por­tant that we know at this time the path for­ward with FI­FA as­sist­ing in over­see­ing our foot­ball. Right now, the Nor­mal­i­sa­tion Com­mit­tee is in charge. I have had good con­ver­sa­tions with the chair­man Robert Hadad on things we need to work on and how we can work to­geth­er to achieve this,” Hy­land said.

“I haven’t met him (Hadad) in per­son as yet but we have had some great con­ver­sa­tions over video calls and he seems like a per­son who wants to im­prove the state of our foot­ball and a great guy. All the stake­hold­ers need to come to­geth­er as one to put T&T’s foot­ball back on the map and back to a re­spectable po­si­tion. From part­ners, fans, coach­es and play­ers, we all re­al­ly need to pull to­geth­er and play our part.”

The for­mer San Juan Jabloteh man in­tends to do his part, once called up­on.

"It is al­ways a plea­sure and ho­n­our to rep­re­sent T&T and a dream come true to not on­ly play but to cap­tain the na­tion­al team. As a play­er, it is just about be­ing able to give back every­thing and share my knowl­edge and ex­pe­ri­ences that I in­her­it­ed from the old­er ones who I rubbed shoul­ders with both at home and abroad. Once I am still in good shape and strong-mind­ed, I will al­ways be avail­able to play and con­tribute to my coun­try.”

Touch­ing on Maradona’s in­flu­ence, Hy­land spoke of the oc­ca­sion which saw him and the rest of the T&T line-up be­ing able to take the field at the fa­mous Es­ta­dio An­to­nio Vespu­cio Lib­er­ti – bet­ter known as the Mon­u­men­tal. It is one of South Amer­i­ca’s three great sta­di­ums along with the Mara­cana in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil and the Cen­te­nario in Mon­te­v­ideo, Uruguay and has host­ed some of the Ar­gen­tin­ian na­tion­al team’s most mem­o­rable games and pro­vid­ed a suit­ably dra­mat­ic set­ting for the open­ing match and the fi­nal of the 1978 FI­FA World Cup, won by the hosts.

“It was great to play against Ar­genti­na just be­fore the 2014 World Cup at a sta­di­um where Maradona’s pres­ence was strong so many times as a play­er and head coach of Ar­genti­na. The biggest play­ers in the world played at that venue and played against us in that game. One of the world’s best Li­onel Mes­si is an un­der­study of Maradona and we had that op­por­tu­ni­ty to take the field along­side him.

“In my life, I didn’t see a lot of Maradona live but I’ve al­ways watched so many clips of him and his in­flu­ence was mas­sive. Play­ing against Mes­si was like play­ing against Maradona in many ways be­cause of their sim­i­lar­i­ties but of course, Maradona is Maradona and we will nev­er see some­one like him again,” said Hy­land.