Mark Trott has emerged as the clear favourite to become Bermuda's next national team soccer coach after his chief rival for the post, Andrew Bascome, yesterday revealed he did not apply for the job.

Bascome had said originally he wanted to apply, but in explaining why he changed his mind he launched a blistering attack on Bermuda Football Association, which he said was "run like a private club''.

The BFA advertised vacancies for national team and junior national team coaches five weeks ago and today they plan to announce appointments.

Former national team coach Gary Darrell indicated to The Royal Gazette a month ago that he was highly unlikely to apply, while Kenny Thompson ruled himself out of the running but said he would be interested in the technical director's job, to be advertised later.

With Bascome out of the frame, Trott would seem to be the leading candidate for the top job, having worked as assistant national coach in last year's World Cup campaign and also as head coach of the national under-23 team.

However, it is unlikely that the new national coach will be announced today.

The plan, as has been stated by BFA coaching committee chairman Jon Beard, is to choose a pool of coaches from the applicants and then select senior and junior national team coaches for both men's and women's teams from that pool.

Bascome, a former national team player who coaches league leaders Dandy Town, said that after reflection he had decided against throwing his hat into the ring.

"I have got my young family to think about,'' he said. "When you are committed to sport, you make big financial sacrifices and as you get older, you suffer because of that.

"I looked at it and thought the post would not be worth making those sacrifices. I think if you're national coach, you have to give up your post at club level, because the national coach should be able to get to whatever games he wants on Sundays, to be fair to players.

"I'm enjoying myself at Dandy Town and I don't feel ready to give that up.'' Bascome's critical comments on soccer's national governing body also suggested that the coach would have found it difficult to work with the BFA.

"It seems to me that the BFA is run like a private club,'' said Bascome. "If FIFA (soccer's world governing body) are giving us a million dollars, then we should be distributing it around the game.

"We should not be spending money on entering tournaments now. We need at least two years of in-house development before we are anywhere near ready to do that.'' Bascome would prefer to see the FIFA grant pumped into the game at grass roots level and particularly into improving training facilities.

Talented youngsters would be lost to soccer, if their local club had no floodlights and a poor playing surface, he added.

"It's up to those who administer the game to make the game attractive to young people,'' said Bascome. "If you keep relying on young players to come and play without any incentives, then they will stop coming. There are other things out there to do.

"It's okay when kids are 13 and 14 and their parents are taking them to training. But when they get to 17, 18, 19, that's when we start to lose them.

"The clubs are the farms and the players are our product and if the BFA wants a good end product, they have to put money into the farms. Players have to be nurtured.'' Bascome believed soccer should offer youngsters from toubled backgrounds a chance to excel in life -- but that was not happening now.

"Struggling kids, kids with single parents, these are the kids who often have talent,'' said Bascome. "These are the kids that church can't reach and the schools can't reach, but the BFA does not want to know them. They think these kids are too rude.

"We don't reach them because the training we give is for average players and our facilities are terrible. I was an honest player, I gave everything to my coaches. But I did not get the information I needed.

"When I played against good players, I used to think, `why does he carry out his work more efficiently than me?' The right information is not getting passed on to players and this is why the game is suffering.'' Bascome added that he would probably be available to help out as a supporting coach with the national programme next season.

Disillusioned: Talented Dandy Town coach Andrew Bascome says he's unhappy about the way soccer is being run.

Mark Trott: Appears to have the the inside track for the vacant post of national senior coach.