Visiting teams grateful for exposure at Exchange Cup 2026

The Vurlon Mills Football Academy’s (VMFA) inaugural Exchange Cup 2026 has presented a golden opportunity to Guyana’s and the wider Caribbean’s youth footballers: a chance to compete against their international counterparts.
The exercise which began last Monday has seen riveting action thus far, with one of the standouts being the Point Fortuin Academy out of Trinidad and Tobago.
Speaking exclusively with Guyana Times Sport, Coach Kester Richards expressed his and his players’ excitement at being able to compete in Guyana.
“Really, really excited to be here; this is a tournament we’ve been looking forward to for a while. We’ve been here in Guyana before, so we really jumped at the opportunity, and the players themselves were very excited to be part of it. Lovely tournament so far, good crowd support, good team environment, so really glad to be here,” Richards told this publication.
Highlighting that the youngsters from Trinidad were eager to travel to the Land of Many Waters, the coach also discussed what he hoped his players would grasp from the competition.
The visiting coach revealed, “They were very eager for this opportunity. This group would not have travelled on the previous occasion, so they were looking forward a lot to coming here. So, I think it augurs well, and probably in the future we might be looking at bringing a few more teams into the tournament.”
He went on to explain, “My hope really is just, as I mentioned before, to pick up on playing styles. In Trinidad, we’re used to playing against a certain style of opponents, and when you look at the opponents here, we see that they’re Caribbean guys; they’re big, physical, fast guys, and it’s really about giving them that exposure.”

“So, in the future, they could really diversify and get better in dealing with different types of opponents.”
Turning his attention to the concept of the Exchange Cup, Richards made a call for more similar exercises in future.
Richards noted, “I think that’s the special thing about this tournament in that, as opposed to just competing within your nation, the tournament gives you the opportunity to get exposure to different playing styles across the islands. So, I think this augurs well, and this is something we should spread across the other Caribbean islands also and continue to invite other islands to be part of tournaments such as this.”
The Exchange Cup was set to conclude on Wednesday afternoon at the Guyana Football Federation’s National Training Centre (NTC).