🇯🇲 - The poet laureate of Concacaf on life in the Middle East, Black Lives Matter & his dream of coaching Man Utd
Miguel Coley wants to be a role model for Caribbean coaches, and he's sharing his verses along the way.
via Instagram
I write a poem
A poem to feel the freedom of time
Time is
Yesterday
Today
Tomorrow
I write a poem
Tryin’ to experience
The source of my being
Waitin’ for the next revelation
Or inspiration
To write a poemfrom “I Write A Poem” by Mutabaruka
Miguel Coley penned his first poem when he was nine.
Growing up in Mile Gully, Jamaica, he didn’t know of the faraway places he would eventually call home. Iran. The United Arab Emirates. But he learned of the world through books.
“I was very interested in reading. It was my pastime,” the FC Baniyas assistant coach said last week from his home in Abu Dhabi.
His education continued, writing more poetry as he got into Shakespeare, Chaucer, some Robert Frost. But after putting together an anthology at age 19 that didn’t get published, he decided to change genres and focus on dub, the Jamaican style of spoken word set to music.
It wasn’t the last time Coley would make a sudden shift.
The 37-year-old has been in the Middle East the last three years, looking to launch a career he hopes will break barriers for Jamaican coaches in the elite levels of the sport.
It’s been six years since his shock appointment to the Jamaica national team coaching staff, when Reggae Boyz manager Winfried Schafer plucking Coley from the ranks of coaching ‘schoolboy football’ at Jamaica College. In 2014, he was celebrating Manning Cup and Olivier Shield triumphs, A year later, he was game-planning how to stop Lionel Messi in the Copa America.
The German manager had visited Coley’s training sessions a few times, Coley assumed simply to scout players. After a chat at a coffee shop, Coley learned it was him who Schafer was researching.
“We sat down and he started asking me some questions about tactics, what I think about this,” Coley said. “After everything he said he wants me to become his assistant coach. I laughed, of course! Not out of disrespect or anything at all for myself, but it was more of excitement. I told him yes. Over the time, we developed a strong bond.”
That bond proved to transcend borders. After Schaefer was let go by Jamaica, he told Coley he’d put him on staff at his next stop. True to his word, he called up Coley when he found his next gig, but Coley had to think about accepting since it would take him from the Caribbean to Iran.
“I had to think a lot about it because at the time, well still, there were issues between America and Iran, the whole political. I have to think about being cautious and all of that,” said Coley, who is married and has a daughter. Eventually, he decided it was an opportunity he couldn’t refuse and signed on as an assistant coach at Esteghlal, one of the country’s most historic clubs.
Adjusting to Iran wasn’t as hard as Coley first expected. Though he maintains his Christian beliefs, he said it was easy to adapt to the Islamic culture, and many players learned English to help soften the language barrier and make life easier for the club’s interpreters.
“It was a goosebump experience, especially in our home games. You have, like, 100,000 persons in the stands,” he said. “The fans there are very fanatic. They love the club with all their heart and support them 100%. The support was tremendous in terms of the fans.”
While the club captured the Hazfi Cup and made the quarterfinals of the Asian Champions League during Coley’s time on staff, he felt the support of the club itself wasn’t matched by that of the fans.
Schafer fell out with club officials and later so did Coley, who currently has a case against the club pending in the Court of Arbitration for Sport.
This is the dark time, my love,
It is the season of oppression, dark metal, and tears.
It is the festival of guns, the carnival of misery.
Everywhere the faces of men are strained and anxious.from “This Is the Dark Time, My Love” by Martin Carter
The memories of Iran are still fond, but there were moments when he felt prejudice against him because of his skin color. He remembers trips to Kuwait and Turkey when he was the only person selected for additional airport screening, and the occasional comments come throughout the Middle East.
Racism and prejudice are not regional issues, however. Coley speaks of colorism in the Caribbean, and like so many he was deeply moved by an uprising against police brutality against people of color in the United States and around the world.
When Coley saw the video of George Floyd being murdered by a Minneapolis Police Officer, he saw himself.
“It was horrific,” Coley said. “I felt that was my neck also. He represented us. His life represented us. Regardless of who he was, what he did, he was a Black man, and in front of everybody he was killed. It was very terrible, and I felt it.”
Mask on, mask off
Yes we gonna march on
Nobody sleeping tonight
Now my head is above the water
Ready to breathe again
All I can see
Is a knee again
It’s like I’m going up
I’m going down
I’m going round and round and round
Tired of the dogmatic, enigmatic, systematic culture that makes me asthmatic
Cause I can’t breathefrom “Mask On” by Miguel Coley
Coley turned to what he has known since he was a boy, putting pen to paper and putting his feelings in verse. He’s pleased to see Black Lives Matter become a more widespread movement, but wants to see strong leadership push things forward and make sure real change takes place in the U.S., the Caribbean and abroad.
“We have to address issues in our communities, continue the fight and reeducating ourself and reeducating the world in terms of who black people are, what we represent, and at the same time also I hope we have a set mandate because now you have Black Lives Matter and have different pockets,” he said. “These are the issues, these are the issues, these are the issues but leadership I think is very important.”
The time will come
when, with elation
you will greet yourself arriving
at your own door, in your own mirror
and each will smile at the other's welcomefrom “Love After Love” by Derek Walcott
Coley probably will end up in Manchester one day.
Which one? That’s up for debate. His home parish in Jamaica shares its name with the city in Northwestern England, and both have their draws.
“My club is Man United, and I hope one day I could become the head coach. It’d be breaking a lot of barriers. One, a coach that is not Caucasian to become the head coach of Man United - and a coach from the Caribbean,” he said. “We have players from the Caribbean who have played at Man United, but we’ve never had a coach on staff of Man United. It’s about fulfilling your dreams, and I still believe in that.”
He’s well aware, though, that a stronger resume than three assistant coaching stints is generally needed to step into the manager’s box at Old Trafford. That’s why a return to Concacaf also could be in the cards.
When he took the job in Iran, he also had an offer to be a technical director for a Caribbean federation. But Coley felt like leaving the region was an opportunity he couldn’t pass up.
Many coaches in the Caribbean are unable to make the financial sacrifice or devote the time to take some of the only courses available to them - often months-long programs in the United Kingdom or Ireland.
“Being a Jamaican coach, with our country having gone to the World Cup only once, is very, very difficult in terms of somebody saying to you, ‘Look we need this coach from Jamaica,’ - unless I become a head coach and my performance goes really well.
“When Coach Schaefer gave me the opportunity I said to myself, ‘This is a chance for myself to show it can be done and open people’s eyes to say, ‘Look Jamaicans have coaches!’.’ Maybe one day they say, "‘Look, we’re going to look at that coach in Jamaica.’
“I use the opportunity to be a role model.”
Ultimately, Coley also wants to give back to the place that made him the man he is today. The place where he was teaching high school after his playing career ended prematurely because of an injury. The place where he offered to train some boys for free before school, which turned into an assistant coaching job, which turned into a head coaching job, which turned into being a national team assistant and the U-23 head coach.
Few kids in Mile Gully see that sort of path to doing something different.
“The main source of income is agriculture, and a lot of the youngsters we tried to get ourselves educated,” he said. “We had youth programs that really got the youngsters engaged or focused on our education and we tried to motivate each other. Some move on, which sometimes causes a brain drain in the community, but some, they do come back.”
Whether discussing tactics or the great poets of the Caribbean, Coley’s brain always is firing. From explaining why the heat in the UAE has changed the frequency he wants his team to press or reciting the work of Guyanese poet Martin Carter, the listener can tell the young coach has range.
We don’t know where it will take him, but we know he’ll chronicle the journey along the way.
Brilliant Jon !