Guyana’s Senior Men’s National Team will undergo a training camp in Tobago next week during which time they will play two training games against the Trinidad and Tobago’s Under 23 Olympic Team and a Tobago Representative team at the Dwight Yorke Stadium.
Guyana, under head coach Jamaal Shabazz, is preparing for the upcoming CONCACAF semi-final round of 2014 World Cup qualifying. They will first play the Tobago outfit from 6pm at the Dwight Yorke Stadium on Tuesday February 14th. The Tobago team will be coached by Bertille St Clair.
The Angus Eve-coached T&T Olympic team will then face the “Golden Jaguars” at 6pm at the Bacolet venue on Thursday February 16th. (Tickets for this game will be priced at $40 and available at match venue on the day).
Shabazz is hoping the training camp benefits his Guyana team which will comprise mostly of home-based players as they prepare to face Costa Rica, Mexico and El Salvador in the qualifiers.
“This is an excellent opportunity for the Guyana team to come over to Tobago to engage in a live-in training camp before the World Cup qualifiers resume.
I thought it would be a great chance to have the players together and what better opportunity to play a match against the Trinidad and Tobago team which is preparing for the Olympic final round,” Shabazz told TTFF Media.
“I think this will give some of the players in Tobago the chance to showcase their ability also and I expect the both matches to be well contested and serve useful for the preparations of both countries as they prepare for their respective qualifying matches,” added the Caledonia AIA coach.
Eve meantime is also looking ahead to a training camp in Costa Rica following his team’s encounter versus Guyana before heading over to the United States in March for another camp ahead of the official qualifying matches in Carson, California.
“We’ve structured the preparations that would see us go straight into the qualifying matches and I think this game which is part of another training camp in Tobago will serve the team well and then we have a trip to Central America before going to the US for the final hurdle,” Eve said.
“We trained really hard the week going into the Finland game and it paid off with a fairly good performance and result for the team last month. We need to work on certain things during this camp such as our ball possession.
In international football everybody wants to move the ball around quickly and you have to have athletes in your team now to maintain a level of high intensity for 90 minutes and more.
We have had about thirty players in training and we are always looking at new players. Those here with us have done tremendously well and we can only take twenty into the tournament and right now every player is fighting to get in there,” Eve added.
US-based midfielder Kevin Molino will not be in the squad to face Guyana as he has rejoined Orlando City but Eve will welcome the return of Kazakhstan-based defender Robert Primus and Sporting Kansas defender Daneil Cyrus who are both coming off injuries.
Squad for Tobago camp
Adam's Construction San Juan Jabloteh
Sheldon Bateau
Defence Force F.C.
Sheldon Clarke
Curtis Gonzales
Direct TV North East Stars
Kaydion Gabriel
Andre Marchan
Jean-Luc Rochford
Jeromie Williams
Caledonia AIA
Trevin Caesar
Zane Coker
Jamal Gay
Micah Lewis
Nuru Abdullah Mohammad
Aquil Selby
St. Ann's Rangers F.C.
Kareem Moses
Cameron Roget
T&TEC F.C.
Jayson Joseph
Marcus Joseph
W Connection
Leslie Russell
Joevin Jones
Andre Quashie
Jomal Williams
Overseas Based
Daneil Cyrus
Robert Primus
Bradley Welch