BERMUDA Football Association president Larry Mussenden is fond of referring to those within the sport as 'the football family'.

But it seems that family is growing by the day.

First the association brought in Keith Tucker as national coach, appointed Kenny Thompson as his assistant to replace the fired Jack Castle. And already working as an assistant was Shawn Smith.

Then it transpired this week that yet another assistant, Keith Trabatznik, had been hired on a temporary basis, although for some reason the BFA wanted to keep that appointment a secret.

And while they were still in the hiring mood, the governing body this week also unveiled Derek Broadley as Technical Director - although that, of course, wasn't a secret as this newspaper had already reported months ago that he was on the short-list and more recently reported that he was to be brought in, but only as a second choice to former Porto coach Dan Gaspar, who was the BFA's number one candidate.

Given the size of attendances at recent games played by the national team at the National Sports Centre, when the boys in red, blue and white step out next week for World Cup warm-ups against a Caribbean team - most likely Barbados - there's a real chance we'll have more coaches at the game than spectators.

With the greatest respect, what is it that Tucker and now Trabatznik have brought to the table?

What have they got that Thompson hasn't, not to mention former national coach Kyle Lightbourne and Shaun Goater, the latter two having been involved in the pro game in the UK for several years.

Good players don't necessarily make good coaches, but one suspects that Lightbourne and Goater, and even Clyde Best, know an awful lot more about the game than those running the show nowadays.

Tucker and Trabatznik's last jobs were with college teams in the States, and although Broadley was once on the staff at Crystal Palace in England, his last role was with the Reading Rage in the US (a real force in the football world!).

College teams in the USA couldn't compete with those in Major League Soccer, let alone professional teams in Europe. They probably couldn't beat a decent pub team in England.

When the New England Revolution, probably regarded as the best and certainly the most consistent club in the MLS, visited Bermuda recently one of their coaches confided (off the record, of course) that the Revs would be no match for any premier club anywhere in Europe, would struggle to compete in England's second tier League Championship, and might also find it hard to get a result against teams in League One and League Two.

That's not an indication that Tucker, Trabatznik and Broadley (whose role, it has to be admitted, is more about development rather than coaching) aren't good coaches.

But rather than have a national coach, a technical director and such a huge back room staff, all of whom are presumably being paid, and all of whom probably have different ideas on how the game should be played, wouldn't it have been better for the BFA to have hired a top European or South American coach with a proven record for the same financial outlay.

Time will tell, as will upcoming results, whether the BFA's hiring policy will reap the desired rewards.

But if Bermuda can't get a result on home turf against the likes of Barbados next week, and are then booted out of the World Cup at the first hurdle by Cayman Islands, don't be surprised if the governing body once again come under some heavy fire from the sporting public.

Stay tuned.

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SHADOW Minister of Community and Cultural Affairs Darius Tucker and Premier Ewart Brown should stick to what they do best (whatever that is) and we'll stick to what we do best.

In the House of Assembly on Wednesday night, Tucker, supported by Brown, attacked the media for not being at the airport on Tuesday night to welcome home the Under-19 cricket team, arriving back from a World Cup where they won just one game.

Tucker lambasted the press for covering the negative stories, but failing to report on the positive.

In case he hadn't noticed, this newspaper covered every match played by the Under-19s in Malaysia, with full reports, scorecards and pictures (at great expense) - which is a great deal more than was provided by the rest of Bermuda's media.

He may not also have noticed that we ran the story that one player, Chris Douglas, was sent home early for disciplinary reasons - the second time he's suffered such punishment in a year. But oddly enough that wasn't mentioned in the House.

But why on earth should any of the media have been at the airport to greet a team who, despite giving their all, were just not good enough?

As one wag suggested, rather than be welcomed home, there were some in the team who should have been put on the 'stop list.'

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GOLF, it has to be argued, is one of the most popular sports in Bermuda.

That fact can be verified by the number of players whose names are printed in this paper every week, competing at a number of tournaments at various clubs.

So why is it that one of the most prestigious tournaments, the Men's and Ladies' Match Play Championships, which have been on the calendar for almost 80 years, have so few entries.

When the event began at Mid Ocean Club earlier this week, there were just 20 men and 18 women. That was just enough to fill the men's championship flight and a four-player first flight. There were also only two flights for the women.

Not too long ago the same tournament would attract close to 100 men, enough to fill four flights.

Perhaps the apathy so prevalent in our two national sports is contagious.

- ADRIAN ROBSON