| Today, Jim was looking into reports that, while the likes of his defender Brent Sancho and Rangers’ Marvin Andrews had been required to travel for the clash with minnows St Vincent and the Grenadines, Hislop had been allowed to stay in England and rest.
And he has made it clear that, if that is indeed the case, he will regard the move as unacceptable.
“I don’t know why Shaka Hislop is not in the squad, perhaps there is a good reason. But if he has been left out because they think they don’t need him for this one, it would be outrageous as far as I am concerned,” he said.
“That would be selective selection and a case of saying one player is more important to his club than another, or that he is bigger than the rest of the team and that’s a disgrace.
“I will be trying to find out what the situation is, though, in this case, it will not do much good because Brent has already left for home.”
This is not the first time Dundee have experienced problems with Trinidad and what appears to be preferential treatment for their English-based players.
Earlier this season, Sancho was stranded in the Caribbean because of bad weather, but those members of the squad based down south did make it back in time to play for their clubs. On another occasion, Jim was less than impressed with the T&T FA’s failure to keep him informed after Sancho picked up a head injury in an international.
Also heading across the Atlantic on international duty yesterday was full-back Jonay Hernandez, who is due to turn out for Venezuela in their South American World Cup qualifier against Argentina in Buenos Aires on Wednesday.
With the defence leaking three goals in defeat at Motherwell on Saturday, Jim admitted having two key men absent from training this week was not ideal.
“We are pleased to have people representing their country, but the timing of this week’s games is not good.
“The defence is obviously an area where we have to be putting a lot of work in during training, but that’s difficult to do when two of your players are away all week.
“With internationals, injuries and Brent and Stephen McNally’s court case the other week, a lot of the time it has not been possible to do the work I’ve wanted to do and it does get frustrating.
“This week is another one where we do not even know if the players will be back in time to play for us at the weekend. We’ll just have to wait until Friday and see if they arrive.” |
