The Best Of The Worst

A poster of the Soca Warriors Football Team painted on a glass front, Eastern Main Road, Trinidad and Tobago.

This window painting has a peculiar interpretation of the Soca Warriors Football Team and it is an attempt by an artist to give support with all his heart. It is also to promote the slogan, We going Germany. Papa Scratch is the proud man behind this work which is a store front window. Scratch has managed to paint two football players, numbers 0 and 9 with very muscular legs. As shown, the players are jostling to retain control of the ball in their attempt to score a goal. The football net on the other hand seems to brushed off to the side and up against the white barrier fence by a gust of wind.

Then, a fan has thrown a ball into the field to distract these two players, Papa Scratch wants to score an extra by adding a second ball careening into the unprotected net. More frightening is the pilot of a BWIA plane who has decided that he too wants to be part of the match and has diverted his flight towards the stadium field skimming over the heads of the spectators to get a better look. Oh who cares, it is Best Of The Worst.

The Soca Warrior's end 2006

No more focking mother cunt flags....game focking done! - The former Soca Warrior captain, Dwight Yorke painted with power paints at the BWIA head office in Port of Spain.

The Uniting of Trinidad and Tobago

Chaconia Gold in merit awarded to the Soca Warrior Football Team for their achievement at the World cup which united the nation of Trinidad and Tobago


Flags fluttered in a semicircle around the National Stadium in tribute, pageantry and flare......Trinidad and Tobago style

A Soca Warrior player walking and bouncing along a red carpet covered with confetti. The carpet lead up to four wonky red steps and to the official platform where he received Trinidad and Tobago's second highest award, the Chaconia Gold (in order of the Trinity). The Prime Minster conceded that no Government could have united Trinidad and Tobago such as the Soca Warriors at a time of political wrangling which had polarized the nation.

Kings of Kings - Trinidad and Tobago

David Beckham relieved grin after England's first goal

So we didn’t win against Paraguay. It hurts like hell and we wish that Russell Latapy had been put in sooner. Never have I heard commentators bending over backwards to say nice things about Trinidad and Tobago. I know that we feel inconsolable, so now we need to look at the reality of football. Anyone can win Football at this level is about the highest possible standard of the games, and we have to admit that we saw more fight than we had seen for some time with our ‘Soca Warriors.” The World Cup is called such because it is hard, not because it is easy. The sort of hunger and fight that it takes to reach to professional level is very real and Trinidad and Tobago has nothing to be ashamed of because there is no compromise at this stage.


John and Yorke's last walk at the 2006 World Cup in Germany

"We worked really hard. We needed a bit of luck, which we didn’t get at the end. But we’ve shown that we deserve to be here and I hope we’ve surprised a few people. It was a massive compliment to us when Wayne Rooney came on, as it showed that things weren’t going England’s way. We kept them at bay for 83 minutes and we are proud of that. It’s a historical match for T&T and it was a great day for us".....Stern John remarks of England against his team.

The last Caribbean team to make it into the second round of the cup was in 1936 and it was Cuba! Think about it? Also more and more players are playing for European teams, everyone is playing at a very highpoint. Our players got very good experience.I am saddened however by the fact that I now wonder who will be the next group of warriors when this team retires soon? That fact should help all of those who are still smarting from the loss, and should help people to understand the kind of talent we sent to Germany. Let us hope that some of the younger players on the team are given even greater encouragement to take us to South Africa in 2010. - Adele

The Battle Of The Advertisers

Christopher Guiness animator 5 week project.

Between the World Cup matches there are a number of advertisements tailor made for the event. One is a very well drawn animation and the other is the typical over the top alcohol piece. The animation features a dreadlocked player aggressively going after a ball in a match. The dominant colours are red, white and black. The images move by as though on film as the vertical lines attest, and the wide format of the action frames are faced by two bands of green that goon to represent ‘B Mobile’ one of the telephone companies.

This advertisement is refreshing. The illustration is well rendered and the timing of the frames are well thought out and just enough to be impacting.The other advertisement features what is termed, ‘the young and the beautiful’ 18 to 24 age range, an attempt at a cross section of the population. These people are seen at a football match and then at an up scale, trendy bar with their faces painted in the national colours. Our local ‘Shakira” belly dancer features prominently.


Zapping into TV land

Angustura touts several of its products between the festivities. There is a public service AIDS advertisement featuring three local‘artists’ locally pronounced (art-easts) and as mattering of furniture and food ads using the football theme. The most creative being one where spectators at home are criticizing the game and end up in the television, on the field, scoring a goal. The advertisement is not as smooth as it should be, but it is one of the more memorable of this World Cup presentation and better of the cheaper and simpler ads. - Adele

Forged from the love of liberty - Trinidad & Tobago

Forged from the love of liberty


A resident of Woodbrook, Trinidad, West Indies

This is an example how Trinidadians and Tobagonians feel over the Soca Warrior's historic debut and stunning draw between Sweden at the World Cup Football in 2006. The owner of this home has propped the flag of Trinidad and Tobago between the window curtains and glass pane. The tasteful gesture says it all.


The National flag of Trinidad and Tobago

The Changing Of The Guard - Dwight Eversley Yorke

Dwight Yorke on spotlight at the TSTT building, Port of Spain, Trinidad

The football player Dwight Eversley Yorke had his humble beginnings by selling crab in Tobago, but had the determination to better himself and kicking ball served his passion. Today, he is the captain of the Soca Warriors team as they prepare for World Cup matches in June, 2006. This is a series of billboards spotlighting local personalities and sportsmen from Trinidad and Tobago as they endorse B mobile. See the Brian Lara billboard.


Other World Cup highlights in San Fernando, Yuh going Germany not Canada

After being lead blindfolded into a large industrial bin filled with competition letters for a World Cup Football trip in Germany, a heavy set woman trotted ankle deep into a sea of envelopes. She then knelt down and dug out the lucky winner. It was a decrepit crumbled envelope.

Soon after the winner was announced, a man with a bruise over his left eyebrow as if he was in a Rum shop brawl was interviewed by Synergy TV. His unenthusiastic disposition and poor diction made many viewers wonder why he ever bothered to participate in the competition in the first placed?

What a catchy slogan: We bringing it home!

Ethnics in sponsorship: It should be noted that when companies commit to a project their logos are prominently displayed in order to get their full advertising worth


Get ready T&T for more of these tasteless billboards throughout Trinidad and Tobago. Well as the saying goes, money can’t buy taste and this highway billboard is a sample of the quality of advertising in Trinidad and Tobago for the 2006 World Cup

Key notes:

1. Make it cheap since it is a temporary billboard
2. Stick to typology because photograph is expensive
3. Remember this is in support of our Bank comes first
4. Offer prizes to be won with first preference to the Bank’s employees …they have accounts with us too.

More balls in support of the Soca Warriors football Team, Trinidad and Tobago

Korean; “ I NO NO WHAT FLAG LOOK”

Up up and away in Germany World cup 2006


An inflated ball mounted on a blue inflatable ring – Site Specific 6, Port of Spain, Trinidad.

On its last leg of traveling throughout Trinidad and Tobago, and then to Germany, the inflatable ball called “The Goodwill Ball Roadshow” finds itself at the doorstep of a popular restaurant in Port of Spain causing a stir of excitement in support of the Soca Warriors team. The inflated football was fastened with rope and with five concrete weights which kept it grounded and not from flying away into the Queen's Park Savannah.


Enthusiasts signing the ball without looking at the flag which represented Trinidad and Tobago. What Nation is that?

Riding My Back

Aiming to ride your back in Trinidad and Tobago

This is a dull billboard lacking any creativity but aiming to ride the backs of the Soca Warriors football team. It speaks of the general attitudes in advertising. The Ad has nothing to do with football, but is representing support where support was never given. And in many ways, it is representational of the culture where praise and admiration to individual achievements are often given after the fact, but rarely before.

Best Village Soca Warrior's Prop

Trumpets, footballs and steelpan players

This is to honour the Soca Warrior Football Team on their road to the Worldcup in Germany, 2006. The sculpture looks like a Best Village prop with silhouettes of trumpets, footballs and steelpan players. The work was moved from around the Savannah to this spot, opposite the former Holiday Inn hotel in Port of Spain. 2006

Best Village is a cultural competition involving all grassroots in Trinidad and Tobago. Generally, it is a kitsch interpretation of what art and culture means in communities and districts.


Dancing a Best Village Spanish dance at the Queen's Park Savannah, Trinidad

I salute the Soca Warriors

I salute the Soca Warriors


Joan Harding as a Dame Lorraine at Victoria Square,Trinidad, 2006

Derived from slaves mocking the French aristocracy from the 18th century, this contemporary Dame Lorraine is in the 21st century and this time she is by mocking Trinidad and Tobago's national football team, the Soca Warriors as they take part in the World Cup later this June.


A Soca Warrior ready of Germany, 2006

And just before this photograph was taken, Joan Harding was tackling and body swerving a football into a open field. Fast and swift, she could not be captured in time. The Dame Lorraine is a Traditional Carnival character and beneath her ring hooped skirt, Harding was wearing a pair of football tugs and matching socks.

The Dame Lorraine costume is emphasized by the physical characteristics of the female derrière. This is helped by padded pillows, and only the Caribbean woman can deliver the swing that exaggerates the movement of the skirt.

Soca Warriors and the Rapunzel Tower

Joining with such wonders as the kaleidoscope Millennium Wheel and Hooped blue and white Eiffel Tower, is the spanking new Soca Warriors Cinderella Rapunzel Tower decked in red, black and white, the national colours of Trinidad and Tobago
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The St. Vincent Jetty Lighthouse was built from the latter part of the nineteenth century and the beckon could be seen as far as ten miles.The leaning lighthouse has been given a few coats of paint and the sponsors have made it their point to paint their logo on the monument.

Less Merciful, Less Compassionate

Master of the Day of Judgment














Show us the straight path



Thee alone we worship; Thee alone we ask for help



A Bahrain player who used any means to score a goal



The disputed goal turned ugly



The path of those whom Thou hast favoured; Not the path of those who earn Thine anger nor of those who go astray
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The display and utter disrespect to Trinidad and Tobago at the World Cup qualifying match in Bahrain, 2005

Quotes from the al-Qur'an: of which the sacred writings of Islam were spoken from God to the prophet Muhammad

Ode An die Freude

A Soca Warrior heading a ball high in mid-air


The moment that caused car horns to blare in Trinidad and Tobago


Weltmeisterschaft fur T&T


Der Countdown zur Fußballweltmeisterschaft in Deutschland


A nation erupting into celebration over its win in Bahrain



A great day for a small country.
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The win over Bahrain which qualified Trinidad and Tobago' Soca Warriors to be part of the World Cup, Germany, 2006

A Nation on the verge of a nervous breakdown

The Soca Warriors are too relaxed, overconfident and cocky


The Bahrain team is focused


Allah; “In the name of God, the Merciful, the Compassionate"


God; “Creator of the Heavens and Earth”


Art in the Stadium, a painting of Dwight Yorke, the captain of the Soca Warriors team


The painter himself with a carnival fancy Indian head piece


Head butt into a T&T net


What a Goalie most fears


Flowered with gifts when he arrives home in Bahrain


But there is a saying that God is on the side of Trinidad and Tobago


Netted equalizer


One down, be we are unsure what his Nation can offer.
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Television stills from the qualifying match between Bahrain and Trinidad and Tobago in Port of Spain, Trinidad, 2005