LAS VEGAS, USA — Concacaf President Victor Montagliani described the mood inside the 34th Ordinary Congress held at the Cosmopolitan Hotel here on Thursday as one punctuated by a strong sense of family.

The Canadian businessman, in his third year at the helm of the sub-continental body, said the exercise in its traditional form took care of business, but crucially it reaffirmed bonds he had been able to establish as he united the 41-member associations, who in turn gave a rousing endorsement of the performance of the administration and its leadership.

In a show of this support, Montagliani and four other Concacaf Council members retained their positions unopposed. There was only one active election on the day as the female member of the council, Turks and Caicos Islands’ Sonia Fulford, was challenged by Bonaire’s Jeaninne Wong-Loi-Sing.

But Fulford, formerly Sonia Bien Aime, convincingly beat back the challenge by 34 to seven votes.

“It was a resounding vote of confidence that I am doing something right… I am very passionate about football, not just women’s football, but football in general and I am committed to the task as I am a hard worker who works continuously. I think the members recognised that and that’s why they gave me another platform for another four years,” said Fulford, the first female to sit on Concacaf’s governing council.

The other five positions, that of president (ex officio Fifa vice-president) Victor Montagliani; vice-president — Caribbean, Randolph Harris; vice-president — North America, Yon de Luisa; member — Central America, Jorge Salomon; and Fifa Council Member — Central America, Pedro Chaluja, all went to the electorate unopposed.

“I think the administration got a big vote of confidence, and it’s clear that people are comfortable with the leadership with the uncontested elections, but not only with my leadership, but with all the members of the Council,” said Montagliani.

The Concacaf head admitted that the experience at the congress was humbling and sobering — a moment to cherish.

“I think the atmosphere was one of family, and it was very emotional for me personally, and so it was for a lot of members who came up to talk to me afterwards, and it all came from a sense of pride that we have all come a long way, and yes, we still have a long way to go, but this was a start.

“I think the tone was we deserved the right to think long term, and that set the tone for the work we have done,” said Montagliani after the congress.

He said the iconic activations powered by the One Concacaf engine have been resounding successes, which the general membership is seen to have bought into and owned.

“The big programmes are like the Nations League, the NextPlay, and we obviously have our initials on the women’s game, the increase in the Gold Cup, the restructuring of our youth tournaments, also a lot of the governance things we have put in place.

“Also important was the little stories, the individual moments we have all shared over the last three years, whether through my travels through the Caribbean or Central America, many of those stories one-on-one with the my presidents were special,” he said, reflecting on his tenure.

At congress, the membership, staff, key partners and stakeholders received, not only an update on Montagliani’s Vision 2030, but also a strategic move that will embrace a philosophy of long-term planning in the immediate to long term.

“That (Vision 2030) is dear to my heart and we are close to selecting someone to drive that from a consultancy standpoint and then we will start to put the building blocks in place to start gathering the data to see what is required from all stakeholders and to see what Concacaf 2030 will be,” said Montagliani, a Fifa vice-president.

General secretary Philippe Moggio spoke glowingly of the long-term visionary thinking, and how the congressed embraced the first four-year budget that was presented on Thursday.

“At this congress, we presented a four-year budget for the first time as we plan for a four-year cycle and this speaks to discipline, long-term thinking and a vision that we are implementing as we have the house in order, and I think the Congress demonstrated that.

“I think the theme of President Victor Montagliani’s speech at congress was that we at Concacaf, as a collective, have now earned the opportunity to think longterm, we are no longer putting out fire drills, we are no longer scrambling, as we are now looking longterm and we have that ability, and with that privilege, I think we can grow football in our confederation,” said the French-Colombian.

Expansion of the flagship Gold Cup and rebranding the confederation is a source of pride, as are all elements of the broad development and growth portfolio.

“We are proud of launching a new brand, which really demonstrated what Concacaf stands for and we are proud of having new headquarters in Miami, which showcases what we are about, so it was a busy year 2018.

“Having done the work and being able to expand Gold Cup from 12 to 16 teams is a great achievement, and this paves the path to have a great competition in 2019, and we have done a lot of planning and promotion around the Gold Cup giving it as much visibility as possible, whether it’s fan engagement, more partners, or commercially, so a lot of work being done for 2019.

“We are also proud to be able to take it out of North America for the first time and into the Caribbean and Costa Rica in Central America, and I know this will be fantastic,” said Moggio as he summarised some of what was presented to congress.

Meanwhile, president of the Trinidad and Tobago Football Federation, David John-Williams, seemed to represent the popular view of the Concacaf membership, when he said: “Congress went very smoothly and was very well organised, plus the information was very forthcoming and Concacaf seems to be in a very good place and we can only hope it continues to progress the way it has been progressing.