Despite preparing to step into senior international football management for the first time in his career, newly appointed interim head coach of Jamaica’s Reggae Boyz Rudolph Speid insists he feels fully prepared for the role and says the addition of Miguel Coley to his support staff is a welcomed boost.

Speid will lead Jamaica into the Inter-Confederation Playoffs in March, when they will have to beat New Caledonia and DR Congo in order to qualify for the 2026 FIFA World Cup. It is a responsibility that he believes his years of experience in management, youth development, and club success have equipped him for the moment.

“Everybody had a first time coaching an international team. It is not just my strength at football that really makes me strong, it’s my other strengths. I have been managing people since I was 22, I understand organisation, I have failed at almost nothing that I have set out to do, [and] those are the things that are going to carry me over the line,” Speid told the Jamaica Observer.

“I have done extensive work in my coaching education and experience, in corporate and we know what true leadership is and I think I am very good at it.”

Part of that short-term focus includes assembling the right support staff and Speid considers Coley a key addition to the effort. He emphasised that the success of the national team will depend on collective expertise, not individual authority.

“Of course, my football knowledge is key but I am not a person who is afraid to ask people who know more than I do, what their opinions are. Otherwise from Mr Coley, there are like three others lining up to come and help. I am getting calls every day to be honest.”

“He [Coley] has a tremendous experience coaching overseas. He is a very smart person. I think his insights will be significant but there are other coaches who coach at a high level – international level, who will be joining the team also. When we put that team together, I think we will have a good group,” said Speid.

“There are people who have certain skills that I will be using so it’s not a Speid thing. The first rule of good management is to employ good people. It’s not me who will have all the answers, it will be the people around me.”

With the play-offs approaching, Speid admits he is uncertain whether he will look to remain in the role after March, largely because of the other responsibilities he already carries in the Jamaica Football Federation.

“I am only thinking about the four months to the end of March. I am not thinking longer than that. All of my focus is just to get the team over the line because that is what we need to do for Jamaica.

“I don’t know, it depends on what the board thinks because I am also a very important member of the board. People think that I only deal with the national senior team but you have to remember what my track record is since I have this job as chairman of the technical committee.

“The National Academy, that was my committee, we did the revamping of the Men’s Premier League, we turned the Women’s Premier League into a professional competition, we are working on the men’s Tier Two; coaching education is also a big thing,” said Speid, outlining the strides made in certifying local coaches.

“In 2018 we had 20-odd coaches with the ‘B’ licence, now we have over 100. We have 1500 ‘D’ Licence, we have about 300 coaches with ‘C’ licences and about 8 ‘A’ licence and 30 more doing it right now and we have about 4 Pro Licence coaches. That is down to the work we have done. Club licensing is also us, so there are a lot of things that we have put together from the technical committee.”

“People like to say ‘Fire’ Speid because we didn’t make it to the World Cup, but that is probably not even 5 per cent of the job that we do. We put in regulations for academies, we do a lot of work,” he added.

“People pretend not to notice but there was a time when the Caribbean was closing in on Jamaica in terms of youth competition success. Last year we won a lot. We won the U14, we won the U20, we came fourth in Concacaf U15. Arnett Gardens won the Shield, Cavalier won the Caribbean Cup and Mount Pleasant is on the verge of winning, so there is a lot of improvement in Jamaica’s infrastructure and building out what a good football nation looks like and we have done extensive work on that, which is not being shouted about,” Speid shared.

Speid is confident that his coaching acumen along with his intimate knowledge of Jamaica’s footballing space as well as his wide-ranging skill set, makes him the ideal individual for the task at hand.

Jamaican fans will be hoping that this is proven to be the case.