Lady Jaguars head-coach Dr. Ivan Joseph said yesterday that the CONCACAF Women’s Under-20 Qualifiers which commence today will be utilized as an avenue to start the rebuilding of the women’s programme.
Speaking at a press conference yesterday at the Ramada Hotel, Dr. Joseph stated, “Our expectation and hope is that it’s part of rebuilding our programme, we will be hopeful to place in the top two to our forward what we call momentum as we continue to build our programme.”
He added, “Part of the necessary foundation blocks for us to move forward is to get more competitions. I don’t think you can get to the national level pool where you are in that hunt to win unless you have some qualifications so you don’t show up starry eyed.”
Guyana has been placed in Group-A alongside Bermuda, Antigua and Barbuda, Suriname and St. Lucia.
They will open their campaign against Bermuda today at the National Track and Field Centre, Leonora from 19:00hrs.
They will then oppose Antigua and Barbuda on Monday at 20:30hrs, before facing off with St. Lucia on July 19th at 20:30hrs.
In their final match, Guyana will tackle Suriname on the 21st at 16:00hrs.
According to Dr. Joseph, “I have been involved with the National team programme for the past year and if we look clearly from our experiences in the qualifiers we see that Bermuda is the most organized and talented group in the pool. They have strong infrastructure and have a longer history, this is our first time in the U20 age group.”
He added, “We probably got two players who have got senior team experience but probably 80 percent of our team is youthful and will be experiencing their first international competition.”
Asked about the criteria that was used to select the team, Dr. Joseph said, “It’s really difficult to be honest and I am assuming that many of the Caribbean nations might be in a similar situation where you are trying to field a team that is sometimes put together from the diasporas with players from the US playing, England playing, Canada playing and here playing.
“We are lucky enough to have an assistant coach that is in the States, that is part of our team. I myself am based in Canada and we have coach Akilah here and we have Coach Kayla that is based in Toronto. Coach Kayla and her group have been running the Toronto based practices.”
“Coach Akilah has been running the Guyana based practices and we relied on coach Akilah to pick the players she thinks is ready and able to step in at this level. ….The challenge is to put together based on one or two practices what you think will be an impactful lineup,” he said.
Guyana’s 20 member squad which features 15 overseas born and based players read Goalkeepers Taylor White and Aneesa O’Brien, Defenders Lensey Adolph, Sydney Puddicombe, Rylee Traicoff, Jessica Myers, Hailey David, Jade Vyfhuis, Midfielders Amanda McKenzie, Kiana Khedoo, Serena McDonald, Shontel Greene, Tori DeNobrega, Nailah Rowe, Jaida Brooks, Jenea Knight and Forwards Brianne Desa, Siacy Adams, Aubrey Narine and Tiandi Smith.
On the management side Akilah Castello will serve as the Assistant Coach, while Kasy Kirash (Goalkeeper Coach), Angelica Holder (Physiotherapist), Paul DeAbreu (Head of Sports Science), Brittany Persaud (Performance Analyst), Paul Beresford (International Team Coordinator), Naseya Brewster (Team Operations Manager) and Kayla DeSouza (Equipment Manager) complete the staff.
Meanwhile the coaches of Bermuda, Suriname, Antigua and Barbuda and St. Lucia have also expressed similar sentiments regarding their teams respective preparation and expectation.
