By Calvin Roberts
The die is cast. The stage is set. Judgement Day has arrived.
This is the moment of truth for Guyana and its Golden Jaguars football team. Nothing less than a victory by two goals is expected over Suriname this afternoon at Guyana National Stadium, Providence.
No other football game has meant as much to Guyana probably since the country made its debut in World Cup preliminaries way back in 1976.
No other team since then had attained as high a world ranking as this one, helped by a joint fifth place finish, from a large field of 25 teams at the last Caribbean Champion-ships sponsored by Digicel, 18 months ago.
This is why expectations of the team were high going into this World Cup qualifying competition from the ardent football fan.
So when the Golden Golden Jaguars went down 1-0 to Suriname in the first game of the home and away series, it left Guyana in huge shock as our Dutch speaking rivals were one of the many countries the locals blew away on their way to the Digicel Cup finals.
This afternoon, therefore is redemption time and Guyana must reverse that shock result in Paramaribo last Saturday to advance to the CONCACAF semi-finals in the race to World Cup 2010 which is scheduled to be held in South Africa.
The team has to play to its full potential though, and for that to happen coach Jamaal Shabazz has to field his very best players from the word go.
This was not the case in the previous encounter and we paid the penalty which left us staring down the barrel for the home game where we have to win by two clear goals.
The situation the Jaguars find themselves in can only be corrected if the team is selected on pure merit. Now is not the time for sentiment or perception to influence the selection of the starting XI.
Guyana has to have its proven players gunning for goals from the first kickoff.
The team’s premier forward Nigel ‘Powers’ Codrington was left on the bench until too late in Suriname.
He has proven himself the team’s premier striker for more than three years and the 11 goals, the nippy forward scored in nine games in the biggest competition in the Region, namely the Digicel Caribbean Cup must make him an automatic starter in any company.
But he cannot do it alone.
Gregory ‘Jackie Chan’ Richardson and Randolph Jerome were brilliant goal scoring allies in Guyana’s seven Digicel Cup victories, while the talented Shaun Bishop and Leslie Holligan marshalled the midfield. Jerome is unavailable now while Holligan has passed away.
Which means that Anthony `Awo’ Abrams, who has been a consistent leading scorer in the Georgetown Football League while showing his prowess for the national team in recent times, has to be in the starting XI too.
In midfield Bishop is a shoo-in starter along with the England born and bred Howard Newton who was unfortunately denied the opportunity to represent the Jaguars in the away fixture.
Howard Lowe and Walter ‘Boyd’ Moore who are proven stalwarts in defence will be required to ease the work load on superb captain Charles ‘Lily’ Pollard.
With John Rodrigues unavailable, Shabazz has to call on his expertise to find a suitable proven replacement there.
At the same time the coach should be assured that goalkeeper Richard Reynolds, who had an exemplary performance despite the loss, will have another excellent game as he did in Suriname.
Suriname is fielding a vastly different team to the one which Guyana hammered 5-0 in the Digicel Cup.
Wensley Christophe, who was not around in Curacao had a brilliant game last Saturday and proved to be a thorn in the flesh of the Guyanese.
So by now it is expected that Shabazz will have in his possession, a plan to nullify the crafty striker. But he also has to come up with plans for Emilio Limon and Melvin Vailes.
Winning by the required margin is not a difficult task and being fast learners you would expect Guyana to be better acquainted with the National Cricket Stadium ground at Providence than Suriname.
The national team has never played a game there and although three days of practice sessions are not much, it is better than nothing.
And of course a huge crowd must be on hand to motivate Guyana 100 percent, the same way the Surinamese turned out in their thousands at the Andre Kamperveen Stadium last Saturday to support their own.
The Golden Jaguars have all the advantages now and having learned from the experiences in Suriname, they are best prepared to attain that important two- goal winning margin and even more.
This is definitely Judgement Day for the Jaguars and all of Guyana will be looking at them for nothing short of a commanding victory based on the talent the squad possesses.
Kick off time is 1530 hrs (3.30 pm).
