By Tony Becca - From The Boundary SUNDAY'S FOOTBALL doubleheader at the National Stadium ended in victories for the Jamaican teams.
With the home teams scoring five goals and conceding not even one, with the Under-23 aggregation tagging Guatemala 2-0 in an Olympic qualifier and the Reggae Boyz nailing El Salvador 3-0 in a friendly, coach Peter Cargill, technical director Carl Brown and the fans must have been happy.
The general standard of play, however, was somewhat disappointing and as happy as they must have been with the victories, the number of goals and the shutout of both teams, Cargill and Brown must be, or should be, concerned as they look ahead to the remainder of the Olympic qualifying tournament and the World Cup qualifiers starting next year.
In the first match, for example, Jamaica totally outplayed Guate-mala and should have scored at least three more goals in the second half; and although they ran rings around El Salvador in the second match, Jamaica not only appeared satisfied with one goal after scoring in the sixth minute, but they almost put the fans to sleep, particularly in the first 30 minutes of the second half.
In the first match, Jamaica's failure to score more goals, to win handsomely, was faulty finishing, and with the players passing the ball around without making any attempt to go forward, in the second match Jamaica failed to score more goals because they did not move forward enough in search of goals.
For long periods in that second match, the Reggae Boyz, with the slow, unimaginative and defensive Theodore Whitmore in midfield and doing nothing to get them going, just tapped the ball from man to man without moving out of their half of the field. In fact, there were times when it looked nothing more than a training session at which the drill was ball possession.
It was a friendly, but it was still a match. On top of that, and even though El Salvador were weak and posed no threat, the fans paid their money and deserved a bit more urgency from the Reggae Boyz.
Thanks to a few players, however, particularly goalscorer Luton Shelton, Keith Kelly and Jamal Campbell-Royce in the first match and Ricardo Gardner in the second, the fans got some of their money's worth.
Shelton was good, really good.
Apart from his delicate flick over the goalkeeper after running past two defenders in the 29th minute, Shelton entertained the fans with some wizardry in the second half particularly when he danced past three defenders in midfield and when he dummied two defenders, went between them as they headed in opposite directions, dismissed two others as he faked to his right before going to his left, then to his left before going to his right and slipping a beautiful pass to Omar Daley in the Guatemala box.
Kelly was also good, very good.
