Mexico’s interim head coach Ricardo Ferretti got more than he may have catered for in his first international match in charge of the Mexican national team in Friday’s 3-3 draw with Trinidad and Tobago at the Rio Tinto Stadium in Utah.
Ferretti’s team found themselves trailing 2-0 before half time before fighting themselves back into the encounter. The 61-year-old Brazil-born coach later admitted that his team had to hold off a very determined “Soca Warriors” unit on the night.
“I think the team completed an acceptable job. It is not easy to come back from 2-0 but we made it 2-1 and then we came back to level it. The defence had some work to do. But generally I think it was a good game and I was happy with that aspect,” Ferretti said. “I am satisfied but naturally I would have liked a better result.”
Asked to comment on T&T, he responded “I think there is the possibility will meet again (in the World Cup qualifiers). Trinidad and Tobago has demonstrated a very high level of play. And this is like a lot of teams in CONCACAF now. They have to also focus on getting better and the level in Concacaf is higher these days and it is not easy to play teams in the region anymore, especially teams like Trinidad and Tobago.
T&T forward Jonathan Glenn scored on his first starting debut for T&T and later expressed thanks to Stephen Hart for giving him the chance after the Iceland-based forward occupied the bench for the entire 2015 CONCACAF Gold Cup campaign.
“I’m pleased with the performance. Mexico is a fantastic team and this was a huge moment for me and I knew I just had to go out there and give it my all. We were unlucky to give up that late goal but I’m still very excited at the moment,” Glenn said.
“I think in the Gold Cup the team was playing really well. The coach spoke to me and he let me know that my time will come and that I just needed to be patient and I just needed to continue working hard. With that mindset I was not worried about, once I was able to continue doing well for my club and have the right attitude, I would get my chance and it came today,” Glenn told TTFA Media.
“We knew they are a great passing team and that at certain spells in the game that we would have to defend really solidly and we would have to go periods of the game without having the ball. I think it was really important that we got the early goal to kind of settle us. But even if we went two nil up that it wasn’t going to be game over because they would be a team that would keep coming at us. We go the third goal and then we were unlucky to concede the third goal which was an amazing one by them,” the 28-year-old Glenn added.
The home-based contingent of the T&T team led by Hart returned home at 8pm on Saturday from Houston.