Silver urges Girlz to learn from loss

REIMS, France:

Jamaica’s Reggae Girlz may not have convinced during their 3-0 defeat to Brazil in their first-ever FIFA Women’s World Cup match on Sunday. However, defender Lauren Silver, is encouraging her teammates to apply the lessons from that loss in their next assignments.

Cristiane scored all three goals as Brazil eased aside the Jamaicans in Grenoble, and Silver, one of the most experienced players in the team with 17 caps, stressed the importance of applying the lessons learnt in their opening match in their other games at this tournament and beyond, starting this Friday against Italy. The Jamaicans will also face Australia in their final group game on June 18.

“We had our first game, [and]obviously, it didn’t go the way we wanted it to, but going into our next game, the word that I would use [to describe the mood] is ‘more centred’. We have kind of refocused, we had a good meeting about refocusing our attention on what is important and making sure that we take the mistakes that occurred against Brazil and learning from them into our next games,” Silver told The Gleaner after a light training session yesterday following their arrival in Reims for their second game of the tournament.

“I would just say this is Brazil. They have been in the World Cup many times, so I think the biggest thing that was hard for us was really just the nerves. It was our first game in the World Cup; you’re going to see mistakes that typically players don’t make, also some organisation issues because it’s very loud in the stadium and it’s not always easy to communicate, but I would say because we are newbies, a lot of mistakes happened that wouldn’t normally happen,” added the US-born 26 year-old, who plays her club football in the Norwegian top flight with Trondheims.

Scoreline not true reflection

“Brazil is world-class, to be fair – they had an amazing game. We had Syd (goalkeeper Sydney Schneider) in the back, which really saved us a lot, I will say that. Do I think the scoreline reflected the game? No, I think we had more mistakes than the scoreline showed, honestly, but we had Syd back there really protecting us,” added Silver. “But I think as a team, we have the potential to play a side like Brazil, to play a team like Italy and Australia, to compete and to win. Sunday just wasn’t our day, but I think with the group of girls we have, we have the talent to compete with any team.”

Silver, who didn’t make it off the bench against the Brazilians, said she is looking forward to the upcoming game and shared that the entire team is eager to make things right and apply what they have learnt against Brazil.

“I am personally looking forward to the Italy game. We learnt a lot from Brazil, and going into the Italy game, first of all, we are playing a team that is very similar in terms of possession, so hopefully, we can take those notes and take it into the game against Italy and maybe we will have a little bit more of an edge going into that game as well,” Silver stated.

Meanwhile, Italy got off to a good start in their opener against Australia, which was also played on Sunday. The world no. 15 ranked Italy got the better of the no. 6 ranked Aussies, coming from behind to win 2-1.