Gilbert looking for improvements against Costa Rica
Published:Friday | September 29, 2017 | 12:00 AMMarc Stamp
Head coach of Jamaica's women's Under-17 football team, Xavier Gilbert, says that his team has certain things to correct in order to get a better result in today's second friendly international at Winchester Park, St George's College, starting at 3:30 p.m.
After losing the first game 3-0 on Friday at the UWI/JFF/Captain Horace Burrell Centre of Excellence, Gilbert is looking forward to a better performance from his girls as they step up their preparation for the Final Round of CONCACAF Caribbean Qualifiers.
"There are a lot of positives we can take into the next game today. We did not manage to score but created opportunities and got behind their defence a couple of times," Gilbert told The Sunday Gleaner after Friday's match.
The coach pointed out that the locals matched their Central American visitors in the first half and found themselves in good goalscoring positions on a few occasions.
"I think we were good in the first 45 minutes. We were very competitive. We created more opportunities than the Costa Ricans. They are experienced, and it is very evident that they are playing together for quite a while, and I think they are little bit better than us," he assessed.
"We should have at least scored a goal, but such is life. There was movement that the Costa Ricans did to open our team. We just have to work on that for the next game. We will try to correct some things heading into the game on Sunday (today)," Gilbert continued.
Gilbert added that he would be making changes to the starting team for today's game as he looks to give opportunities to other players in the squad.
STARTING 11 REORDERING
"We will definitely change the starting 11 in order to give other players a chance. We have 24 players, so the plan is to give them playing time in order to look at the players for the CONCACAF qualifiers next month," he concluded.
The Jamaicans - the 2015 Caribbean champions - as well as two-time FIFA Under-17 Women's World Cup qualifiers Costa Rica are both preparing for the CONCACAF qualifiers in Haiti from October 16-22.
Jamaica will play in Group F with Trinidad and Tobago and Bermuda. Group G includes Cuba, Haiti, and Puerto Rico. The winners of both Groups automatically qualify for the CONCACAF Round of World Cup Qualifiers, and the two runner-up teams will have a play-off for the third spot to CONCACAF.