SAO PAULO, Brazil — Jamaica’s Under-17 football team arrived here for a three-week training stint a tired but excited bunch after travelling for approximately 24 hours from Kingston.

The 31-member delegation arrived in three groups, with the first set of three — including goalkeeper coach Clive Wedderburn — arriving on Wednesday morning, followed by nine persons on Thursday morning, with the rest catching up yesterday afternoon.

Team manager Roy Simpson said everything went smooth and the players are eager after arriving at the sprawling and impressive Traffic Academy.

“Travelling for eight hours from Miami to Brazil is an experience, but for the players, they are more excited about being part of the continued journey to our success. The long flight didn’t at all have any effect on them,” Simpson told the Observer.

“These are players that understand what the commitment are and it’s a good experience to show them what international football is about and what it takes to succeed at this level,” he added.

“I think I am in football long and I have never been to such a facility and it shows why certain countries do better than some,” he said.

“It also shows you the kind of commitment the federations have to get this team qualified because this is a first-world facility and I hope this is what we’ll assimilate in Jamaica,” said Simpson.

The players had a light training session on one of the seven carpet-like fields available at Traffic Academy, which head coach Wendell Downswell said was to get them out of the jetlag state of mind.

“The fact that we’re here now, we’ll structure the programme accordingly based on what we have seen and the games that we will be playing,” Downswell said.

When the draw for CONCACAF World Cup qualifiers took place on Wednesday in Jamaica, Downswell was on his way to Brazil and on arrival was a happy man knowing that Jamaica had been grouped with Guatemala and Trinidad & Tobago.

“We’re very optimistic, we think we have a realistic chance of qualifying for the World Cup and this is the dream and aspiration of an entire nation,” said Downswell.

The squad is scheduled to return home on January 4 and with the 12-team qualifiers set for February 12-28, Downswell is hoping the JFF gets its wish of extending the training to six weeks, thus returning just ahead of the tournament.