"MY SON CRIED IN MY ARMS WHEN WE QUALIFIED. I JUST FELT INTENSE JOY"

Former Huddersfield and Barnsley midfielder Dean Gorre stepped up from assistant to manage Curacao in their decisive fixture in Jamaica - with his boy in the starting line-up

- Rob Stewart

How did you first become involved with Curacao?

I was approached to become technical director of the federation four years ago and it was an easy decision, because Curacao is my second country. I was born in Suriname and raised in the Netherlands, but my mother was born in Curacao. My wife's roots are in Curacao as well, and my children are part Surinamese, part Curacaoan, part Dutch and were raised in England. We call Cheshire home. There is a strong Dutch flavour because Guus Hiddink, Patrick Kluivert, Dick Advocaat and now Fred Rutten have all been the head coach, making us technically and tactically good, and we've built on that by being a hard-working Caribbean side.

What have been your various roles?

A technical director must do a lot more jobs when you work on a small island, so I'm involved with the academies, the coaches and the coach educators, and with the women's football that I set up here. When Dick Advocaat asked me to be his assistant, I said, "Why not?" I've done every single job in the federation apart from washing the kit!

What was it like to work with him?