Reggae Boyz complete Gold Cup preparations with 4-1 win
Published: Tuesday | June 30, 2009
Morrison
GEORGE TOWN, Grand Cayman:
HIS team is not getting the fluency Theodore Whitmore wants. But they're getting the goals.
However, the Reggae Boyz head coach does not seem altogether worried because the major area of his team not working according to its functionality, the defence, is expected to have an overhaul in personality that could fix his problems.
"The coordination in our defence ... it's not 100 per cent and I'm sure that against better team it will cause problems," Whitmore said after the Jamaicans' 4-1 victory over the Cayman Islands on Sunday night.
"But we've the sort of players going in to the Gold Cup who know how to play there and will play there," the Jamaica coach pointed out.
Tyrone Marshall and strongman Ian 'Pepe' Goodison, are two of the players who are expected to join Whitmore's squad for the CONCACAF flagship event, which Jamaica will kick-off against Canada at the Home Depot Centre in Los Angeles on Friday.
The Cayman match culminated a week-long training session, geared towards sharpening the team for the Gold Cup.
Bryan Bayliss (22nd), Rafe Wolfe (43rd), Keammar Daley (67th) and Jason Morrison (82nd) scored the goals for Jamaica.
Training session
Rene Carter scored for the Cayman Islands at the 40th minute.
"To score four goals in any game you can't argue about that," he said.
But?
"It's not the sort of performance we were looking for," Whitmore said. "But it sums up a good week's training session where we could see that some of our players were fatigued."
The team trained twice daily and had also tackled a Cayman Islands All Stars on Thursday night, when they led 5-0 before heavy rainfall, accompanied by lightning, forced a 70th minute blow-off.
On Sunday, despite not playing fluently, Jamaica easily dominated the contest against their hard-nosed opponents.
"Now is the time that we've to do these things to get it right," said Whitmore, pointing to the areas they never got right in the game.
It was the last competitive engagement for the Jamaicans prior to the CONCACAF Gold Cup tournament. It also marked the climax of a one-week training camp in the Cayman Islands.
Jamaica had high percentage possession and were clearly dominant as they moved the ball well to make easy advance deep inside Cayman territory in the first half.
Goal disallowed
However, they only led 2-1 at half-time because the finishing and decisions inside the final third were not good most of the times.
Luton Shelton had a shot blocked by the goalie then a goal disallowed later, after sliding a header taken by Devon Hodges across the goal line.
Hodges, on another night, might have had a quick hat-trick but missed open chances, while Wolfe had a header saved and there were several shots that were hit high when players found themselves open atop the penalty box.
The Reggae Boyz often complained to the referee about calls they believed should have been made in their favour and Whitmore said the officiating had an impact on the team's play.
The Jamaicans maintained their superiority in the second half, but never controlled proceedings in the same manner as the first, despite scoring two unanswered goals. It is not that they were under pressure defensively, as the Cayman Islands attacked in a disjointed fashion and only had one solitary kick for the entire half, a speculative effort from near half line that was easily handled by substitute goalie Duwayne Kerr.
What appeared to affect Jamaica more than anything else was their focus on the referee's decisions.
"I think the refereeing got to our team, we got caught up with the referee," admitted Whitmore. "But it's really preparation going into the Gold Cup and there's where it matters most," Whitmore noted.
"The team's got a lot of talent," said Cayman Islands FA technical director, Carl Brown.
He added: "With the Gold Cup just days away, I'm just probably a bit worried about the back line, it really needs better co-ordination around there.
"I hear coach Whitmore said that better players will use the space that we saw, particularly that they're playing with three at the back there. But I'm really happy with what I saw, the authority with which we see people like Stew Peas (Damion Stewart) and Claude (Davis) playing with augurs very, very well for the team.
"In midfield there are some young players, very talented players, the mobility inside there was very, very good and it's just an upward trend of the Jamaica team and just how far they've grown. This is a great improvement on past national teams that we've seen," observed Brown, the former Jamaica Football Federation technical director. The movement off the ball is very, very good and we just have to keep working at it.
"This is going to be very important when they hit the Gold Cup scene," he warned.
The Boyz returned home yesterday morning and will depart today for the United States, where they will participate in the Gold Cup.
Daley
TEAMS:
Jamaica: 13 - Dwayne Miller (Duwayne Kerr 66th), 4 - Claude Davis, 3 - Damion Stewart (Des-mond Breakenridge 68th), 6 -
Cayman Islands: 1 - Joseph Tatum (Ramon Sealy 67th), 13 - Rene Carter, 14 - Benjamin Cupid, 19 -
