Bicknell hoping for more national, club success
Published:Thursday | January 5, 2023 | 1:23 AMLivingston Scott /Gleaner Writer
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AT THE Concacaf Men’s Under-20 Championships last June, coach Marcel Gayle struggled to find a suitable central midfielder to anchor the midfield. The team started the tournament with Lance Rochester in the role in their opening 1-1 draw against...
AT THE Concacaf Men’s Under-20 Championships last June, coach Marcel Gayle struggled to find a suitable central midfielder to anchor the midfield.
The team started the tournament with Lance Rochester in the role in their opening 1-1 draw against Costa Rica.
The team then put captain and attacking midfielder Christopher Pearson into the slot, but he also failed to add stability to the centre of the park against Honduras in a 5-0 defeat.
During that game, with the team 4-0 down, Alexander Bicknell was brought in to play the central midfield role, and he slotted into the position seamlessly.
After not seeing a minute in the first game, and only coming on in the 67th minute in the second match, Bicknell played every minute of the young Reggae Boyz other three games. The team would exit the championships at the quarterfinal stage after a 1-0 loss to the Dominican Republic.
The 17-year-old, who plays with the under-19s for German club Fortuna Colonge, is eligible to play in the next cycle of u-20 competitions, and he is looking to build on his previous exploits.
“It was a good tournament for me. I felt good about how I performed. I just have to keep focused and keep going. I still have the next under-20 (tournament) to play. I have high hopes for that, so I will keep going, keep pushing and see where it goes from there,” he said.
‘Zander’, as he is commonly called, has been in Germany for the last four years with Colonge although he left Germany briefly in 2022 to represent Mona in the Manning Cup in the truncated 2021 season.
In his first season with the u-19 team, he has played 15 matches, and the midfielder believes he is progressing in the right way.
“It is my first year and I have started off pretty well. I have played 15 games. I have scored two goals. I think I am on the right track. I see myself getting better every day, and I have been putting in the work as much as possible,” he continued.
His ultimate goal is to break into the club’s senior team, and he declared that he has been working extremely hard to put himself in the position to achieve his ambition.
“We train twice a day. I wake up at 6 a.m. to train, then go to school, and after that I go to train again, and I have a game every Saturday.
“I think I can step up for sure. That is my aim. The whole team has been great so far, and I am just working as hard as I can on improving myself every day and I feel pretty good about where I am at and the progress I have been making.”