BRING it on!

The visit this week of crack Brazilian side Santos can leave no doubt in the minds of organisers that this is the type of quality opposition local football fans want to see.

A crowd estimated at more than 4,000 ? perhaps the biggest at any match since the opening of the National Sports Centre ? and a fairly healthy gathering at Somerset in appalling weather on Tuesday night, would seem to indicate that incoming tours like this should become far more frequent.

The visitors, it should be remembered, didn?t count among their ranks a single member of the Santos first team squad. Those on the Island this week were either reserves or juniors.

Yet the lure of samba soccer was sufficient to whet the appetite of many who wouldn?t normally venture to a local game.

Both matches, also, were played in chilly conditions which traditionally have kept even the most ardent fans at home.

No disrespect to our local teams, but the steady diet of domestic league and cup play isn?t nearly as attractive as the proposition of watching visiting professionals.

Clyde Best, one of the orchestrators of this week?s games, said previously that if the Santos venture was successful, then more tours could be on the cards ? involving other South American sides and possibly clubs from Europe.

That?s not only good news for the fans but especially for national coach Kyle Lightbourne who?s acutely aware of the importance of playing against top class sides from abroad.

His squad can only have learnt from the 3-0 defeat they suffered at the hands of Santos last Sunday.

And if there?s been one disappointment, it was that the national team didn?t get a second chance to take on the visitors.

Rather than field a League Select, as was the case in the final tour match last night, surely it would have made much more sense to have given the national team another run-out.

With no major competitions on the horizon, chances for Lightbourne to watch his squad in action and experiment with new players are few and far between.

When quality sides do arrive on the Island, shouldn?t we be making the most of that opportunity?

OF COURSE, there was one other negative associated with this week?s tour, which wasn?t altogether unexpected.

Three national team players refused to take a third drugs test after their first two were deemed ?invalid?.

As such, pending appeal, that trio now face a year?s ban from all soccer.

Is there any more to be said?

Not really.

While none of the three have been found guilty of taking drugs, their refusal to submit to a third test is, in the eyes of the Bermuda Council for Drug Free Sport, an admission of guilt itself.

And the punishment is mandatory.

But let?s not kid ourselves. Drugs in local football is still a huge problem.

And it still isn?t being tackled as vigilantly as it should.

It seems the problem only comes to prominence whenever players in the national squad are tested.

So what?s happening during the rest of the season?

Shouldn?t random testing throughout league play be weeding out the offenders?

It would appear not.ARGUING why Bermuda Track and Field Association were still undecided over whether to send a team to this year?s Small Island Games, despite having long missed the entry deadline, president Judy Simmons said this week their obligation was first and foremost to events run by the regional and world governing bodies.

Surely, the BTFA?s first and overriding responsibility is to their own athletes.

It?s common knowledge that a number of local road runners and track runners were and still are very keen to travel to this July?s Games in the Shetland Isles, some prepared to pay their own way.

Yet their own governing body, the BTFA, didn?t even have the courtesy to reply to an invitation from Games organisers.

Is it any wonder we have so many problems within local athletics?