Following on the heels of the Digicel Caribbean Cup August 17 media launch in Kingston Jamaica, host country Curacao staged a press conference at the Netherlands Football Association Headquarters to announce their role in this year’s tournament. Further qualifying groups in the Digicel Caribbean Cup will be held in Cuba, Guadeloupe, Antigua, Jamaica, and United States Virgin Islands.

Speaking at the event, Hans Lute, Chief Executive Officer for Digicel Netherland Antilles said Digicel has increased its investment in this year’s Caribbean Cup reflecting the company’s strong commitment to the development of football for fans and players across the region.

According to Lute, “Digicel is committed to supporting football, a sport that creates tremendous excitement and passion across the Caribbean. We are enormously proud to be working with the Curacao Football Association and the Caribbean Football Union (CFU) to help bring more international football to the fans and players of all Curacao.”

Reginald Francisca, President of the Netherland Antilles Football Association, said “It is a joy to welcome the Digicel Caribbean Cup to the Netherland Antilles.  With six matches over three days, we are looking forward to a real festival of football with a rare opportunity for fans to enjoy international football on their doorstep and we look forward to welcoming big crowds for all six games.”

According to Francisca, “The entire Netherland Antilles Squad is looking forward to the Digicel Caribbean Cup. Trinidad & Tobago’s success in the 2006 FIFA World Cup proves the potential of Caribbean football and the Digicel Caribbean Cup is not only an important tournament in its own right, to find the best team in the Caribbean, but a great platform for us to develop for future World Cup qualifying campaigns. We have some tough and exciting matches, especially vs Suriname on September 10, but we are positive that we can qualify and treat the fans to some exciting football.”

Following the success of the first Digicel Caribbean Cup in 2004/5, an additional investment is being made by Digicel to expand the tournament, thereby increasing the number of matches and providing fans the opportunity to experience more international football. Each team will play each other on one occasion with the top two teams in the group process qualifying to the next round. 

In the meantime, Digicel, always aiming to meet the expectations of fans have developed a number of fans initiatives for the games. These include: free Digicel handouts and football memorabilia; chances to win cash and prizes in promotional games and activities.  Digicel will also create a party carnival type atmosphere at each game, featuring entertainment by the Digi girls and a football beat.

With a record twenty-five teams entered for this year’s competition, the tournament promises to be the largest ever Caribbean football competition. A second round of qualifying groups in November will be followed by an all new eight team finals in Trinidad and Tobago in January 2007, a significantly expanded finals tournament by comparison to the four team finals of 2004/5.