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History of KSAFA Syd Bartlett
 To
see him going through tight defences as he bobbed and
weaved, and shunted his way, his entire body moving as
if it were boneless ; or to see him with his index
finger pointing to the sky as with ball seemingly tied
to his boots, he swayed from side to side, evading
defender after defender, you knew why he was never
called by his given name: Sidney Bartlett
Sports Stars by Tony
Becca Sidney ‘The Worm’ Bartlett : best
player on the ball' Jamaica Daily News August
12,1973.
Overview
The Syd Bartlett
League was introduced as a second tier senior
competition to the Major League in the KSAFA 1983/84
season . It was named in honour of Syd Bartlett ,
Jamaica’s football icon of the 60’s and who according
to KSAFA 1st vice –president Russell Bell, was the
greatest player of that era.
The decision to
introduce this second level competition, followed the
Council’s review of its ten year Major League
predecessor. Both senior competitions were to be
twinned for sponsorship over the ensuing years. J Wray
and Nephew under the Red Label Wine brand was the
first title sponsor. This remained so until the early
1990’s. The Chinese Benevolent Society shared KSASFA
‘self’ sponsorship of the competition during the early
and up the mid 1990’s. Jamaica National Building
Society came on board in the 1995/96 season under the
new Stewart Stephenson administration. This was to
continue over successive administrations through to the
2006/07 season . Discussions were entered into with
Victoria Mutual with a view to secure their corporate
sponsorship for the 2007/08 season.
Real Mona FC were
the inaugural 83/84 champions
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Syd Barlett
(seated ) surrounded by friends |
Commencing with
2001/02 season, the Syd Bartlett League was down
graded to a 3rd level KSAFA competition (after the
Super and Major Leagues).
Who was Syd
Bartlett?
They called him the ‘worm’
and sometimes for the sake of variety it was the
‘S-One’
Syd Bartlett died
in the Intensive Care Unit of a New York Hospital on
Saturday December 19, 2009 following a prolonged
kidney-related ailment. He was 70.
Tony Becca, Daily
News Aug. 12,1973 page 22
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Sidney ‘The Worm’ Bartlett : best player on
the ball' |
Many ‘moons ‘ have
passed since Bartlett’s departure from the scene in
the mid 60’s. .The millennium generation or the
generation now may well ask the question about the
antecedents of a man, who many of his contemporaries
dubbed a genius – the football quintessence of the
latter part of 1958 to the early decade of the 60’s.
Syd Bartlett honed
his early skills both in football and cricket on the
playground of Doncaster. He attended Gaynstead High
School where he soon gained the shortened name of
‘Siddy’ as was the custom of schoolboys. He played
Facey Cup football and Harrison Cup cricket as a
wicket-keeper batsman for his school. According to
sports editor Tony Becca:
Siddy rose from the
obscurity of Private Secondary Schoolboy sports to the
floodlights of international representation because of
his twinkling feet. Faced with the brilliance of
Anthony Hill and Denzil Lue, the incumbent inside
forward, the ‘worm’ seemed destined to a long wait for
his Jamaican shirt. (ibid).
Siddy got his first
international tour in 1958 . As luck would have it, he
was taken to Trinidad to replace the injured Denzil
Lue at inside right. Becca continued: This was the
beginning of a long illustrious career as Siddy
dazzled the Trinidad defence and fans alike with his
deft movements and accurate passing. (ibid) Following
this tournament, Siddy was selected to the first ever
West Indian football team to tour England.
Bartlett represented
YMCA in the Jamaica Football Association’s Senior
League football competition in the latter part of the
1950s to the early 60’s.In those days, his club ranked
with such giants as St George’s College Old Boys,
Railway and Melbourne. But the clash of them all was
St. George’s and Y.M.C.A . For St George’s there were
Hill and Lue up front, with ‘Digger Largie, Marsden
Chen and Aubrey Lowe in the back .Y.M.C.A. had
Bartlett ,Owen Parker and Alvin Schloss. But more than
that : it was a battle between Bartlett and Hill- the’
ball artists’ of the Caribbean.(ibid)
Becca also spoke
highly of Syd Bartlett’s character: …throughout his
career he was a model for all. Never for him the rough
play, the questioning of referees, nor the late
arrival. This was never the behaviour of champions,
Sidney Bartlett was a champion. (ibid )
When the JFF brought
George Penna from Brazil to prepare the national team
for the Central American and World Cup eliminations in
1962, Siddy, the bronze coloured, quick smiling inside
left, was Penna’s ace. He was entrusted with the job
of making openings and pulling defences for the two
strikers, Lascelles Dunkley and Peter Chevannes.
(ibid)
Jamaica was to reap
commendable successes during the Penna era. Puerto
Rico was drubbed 6-0, Cuba beaten 4-1, Venezuela held
2-2 and came close to tripping the highly fancied
Mexicans. According to Becca By this time, Siddy had
shed the challenge of Lue and Hill. Older men searched
their memories for comparisons and names like Alty
Sasso, Arthur Mackenzie,and J.K Holt Jr. reeled off
their tongues (ibid).
Syd Bartlett was lost
to Jamaican football following the exodus of local
players to the professional leagues in the United
States in the mid sixties. Today Siddy lives in a
Nursing home in New York, United States of America.
When the KSAFA
decided to name its second tier league in Syd
Bartlett’s honour in 1983, the Council invited world
renowned sports historian and statistician Jimmy
Carnegie to write a tribute about the man in its
newsletter called the ‘Tackle’. In his essay entitled
‘ Siddi Bartlett-an Impression ‘ Jimmy Carnegie paid
tribute in what was regarded as a seminal piece which
is now reproduced below in its entirety:
I was
asked to do a piece, at very short notice, on Sydney
“Siddi” Bartlett the outstanding Jamaican baller of
the late 50’s and early 60’s-who has been fittingly
honoured by the KSAFA in having their selection
competition named after him.
I was
reluctant because there was really no time for
proper research, but Siddi was one of those
sportsmen to whom no statistics can do justice so
that a purely personal impression may indeed be a
fitting one or attempt at such.
Siddi
Bartlett was the middle figure chronologically of a
triumvirate of Jamaican soccer stars who have
captured the imagination and fancy of Jamaican fans
over the last generation or more. He came after
Lester “Fairy Boots” Alcock but before Allan “Skill”
Cole. Note that all three were forwards and that all
three were popular, although both Fairy Boots, to a
lesser extent, and Skill to a greater, were popular
for reasons that extended beyond football, while
Siddi was more of a purely football star. He was far
more identified with one club Y.M.C.A. just as Fairy
Boots was with Railway. Skill, on the other hand,
seemed to move from school to school or club to club
and eventually from Jamaica before returning.
Siddi
was an interesting figure. He started, as one recalls, his footballing life at Doncaster, the old Scouts
Headquarters –part of the general area which has
fathered many a great Jamaican sportsmen including
two of the three greatest, George Headley and Don
Quarrie. One heard whispers about him even in those
days, to be rapidly confirmed when he began playing
for Y.M.C.A. in the Senior League.
What
did Siddi have? The answer, in one word, was artistry.
He was perhaps fortunate to have good looks and
attractive personality which certainly aided him in
acceptance by the public but Siddi also played a
brand of football which could only be compared, in
local terms, with the way in which Frank Worrell
batted, and Leo Davis played table tennis. Remember
too, that it was at a time when the Brazilian
revolution was just beginning to penetrate the
football world after their World Cup triumphs of
1958 and 1962, and when Pele was also just becoming
the universally accepted "World Supreme" of the game.
What
was the essence of this brand of football?
I
remember seeing Siddi
at his best in an obscure
match played at the University of the West Indies, on a bumpy
ground. Playing at inside right as usual, (and in
those days 4-2-4 was just raising hell and there was
no talk of strikers) he picked up a ball from
midfield, moved to the right, perilously close to
the touchline, and somehow managed to beat in three
or four small spaces of defenders who apparently had
him penned up before sending the ball over with a
left-footed centre for a scoring chance. This was
all done with such grace, elegance and style that no
other Jamaican player of this generation has quite
matched although Dennis Ziadie at least in the same
class (in this writer’ view ) as Alcock, Bartlett
and Cole was also very smooth.
Siddi
was, not surprisingly, also a very clean and sporting player, and a better shot than most.
Perhaps, more surprisingly however, is the great
team player he was despite his stature
and fame. He would
be the first to credit a great deal of his success
and that of the Y.M. team, of the late 50’s and early
60’s, (certainly one of the best Jamaican club sides
of this past generation) to his team mates, especially Elvin Schloss in the mid-field ( one of
the most under-rated of all Jamaican players) , and
the bustling Peter Lewin on the left wing. It was
this trio that at times, also “did the Job” on the national
team.
These
three footballers often weaved triangle of doom for their
opponents across the field. They, and their team
mates, were models of a physically fit team. They helped Senior Football to make the transition
from Sabina Park and other Club grounds to the
National Stadium. At its best indeed, the Y.M. team
provided an excellent example of workmanship
transformed into football science. When Sydney”
Siddi” Bartlett got the ball however, even on a bad
day or night, his workmanship transformed football
Science into Art.
Syd Bartlett Chronology
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1983/84 Real Mona FC
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1984/85 Santos FC
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1985/86 Santos FC
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1986/87 Elleston Flats
FC
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1987/88 Duhaney Park
FC
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1988/89 Meadforest FC
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1989/90 Duhaney Park
FC
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1990/91 Bull Bay FC
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1991/92 Brown’s Town
FC
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1992/93 Liguanea
United
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1993/94 Duhaney Park
FC
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1994/95 Elleston Flats
FC
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1995/96 Seaward FC
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1996/97 Barbican FC
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1997/98 Maxfield Park
FC
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1998/99 Meadhaven
United FC
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1999/2000 Bull Bay FC
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2000/01 Bull Bay FC
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2001/02 Whitfield Town
FC
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2002/03 August Town FC
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2003/04 Police
National FC
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2004/05 Cooreville
Gardens
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2005/06 UTECH/Papine
FGC
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2006/07 Liguanea
United
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