TUCKER, St James — Donovan Duckie’s job as head coach of Jamaica Premier League team Montego Bay United (MBU) is not under any threat, according to President Orville Powell.

After a good start to the season when they lost just once in their first seven games, MBU have fallen to ninth in the standings with just 18 points, meaning they have accumulated six points in their last nine games.

The former two-time champions’ most recent win came on January 15 when they edged Faulkland FC 1-0 in a Montego Bay derby and Powell told the Jamaica Observer West the speculations about Duckie’s job security might have come from “fans who want wins and long to see the team return to the top”.

Powell told the Observer West that he had not put any demands on the coach or the players.

“I have to be real,” he said.

“We have to have sensible expectations from the players and yes, I know every coach wants to win, but I also believe we need to build a foundation to get back to the top and we just don’t have the quality to win right now and we must pay our dues.”

MBU finished at the foot of the table last season, their first back in the Premier League after being relegated in 2019, and Duckie pointed out recently that most of the players in the squad this season were in the squad last time out.

Powell conceded that some of the speculation could have come from his impatience with coaches in former years which has seen the club change head coaches a number of times.

“I have no plans to hire any new coach for the team,” he told the Observer West, but added there might be a difference in approach that he would take.

“I would have played more young players. I would suggest that we try to bring through more young players but the coach wants to win.”

Powell said he has taken a hands-off approach to the team this year

“No one reports to me, they don’t tell me what the plans are, whether we win or lose or why we play a certain line-up,” he said, adding that he did meet with the team about two weeks ago.

He said the early season success when the team was in the top three for more than a month could have given the coaching staff and fans hopes of being able to challenge for titles this season.

“I don’t think our players run enough in games and they got away with it early in the season,” he said.

“We did a lot of work in the early part of the season but once the other teams got up to speed we were not able to keep up.”

He said he was “amazed” at how Duckie got the entire team to play defence but speculates whether this is at the expense of the offensive end of the team as MBU has managed just 11 goals in 16 games.

Duckie acknowledges the lack of goals, telling the Observer West on Sunday after their come-from-behind 2-2 draw against Molynes United at Wespow Park, “I thought despite coming from behind we did well, but we were dismal in front of goal, this is the story of our season. We have had this conversation over and over. The opposition sees our goal twice and they score, we see their goal nine times and we fail to score or we are trailing. We have had good preparation, we are sound, very organised and looking good but not scoring.”