SAO PAULO, Brazil — The Jamaica Under-17 footballers captured the Edson Fabio Machado trophy with a come-from-behind 2-1 win over Amparo senior team yesterday.

The 70-minute game was played in honour of veteran Brazilian journalist, Edson Machado, who is the editor of a newspaper named Tribunal.

Captain Omar Holness, who is nursing a slight injury, came off the bench and scored twice in the 55th and 64th minutes.

Amparo captain Roberto opened the scoring in the 11th minute after his deflected shot wrong-footed goalkeeper Odean Clarke.

Consistent with what he has done since arriving here, Holness led from the front by scoring two goals in nine minutes for the win — the second so far on their six-week training stint. Their first win, from eight matches, was a 5-1 result over the Rio Claro Under-18s.

Following a good right-sided build-up, Ramone Brown was adjudged to have beenn pushed in the back as he was about to meet Andre Lewis’ teasing cross in the box.

Holness confidently dispatched the penalty kick powerfully into the roof of the net.

Then the Wolmer’s schoolboy won the match with a brilliant curling effort from just outside the box — a goal worthy to win any game.

Machado was on hand to present the trophy named in his honour to the Young Reggae Boyz, who showed a lot of courage fighting back players much older than they are.

Head coach Wendell Downswell was obviously pleased and said his young aggregation surprised him.

“It was amazing what they did. They are showing a level of maturity against older players. They were down one nil to a defender’s goal and that didn’t deter them,” he pointed out.

“This is a morale-boosting victory, and based on where we are, this means a lot to them in terms of their confidence in general,” he added.

With the two wins, the Jamaicans have drawn against Paulinia FC 3-3, coming from three goals down. They have tasted defeat five times.

The young Reggae Boyz are scheduled to play at least two more practice games before they depart on January 23 for Jamaica where they will play two friendly games against the United States of America on January 27 and 30.

Jamaica will host the CONCACAF Under-17 Championship between February 14-27, and the Boyz are drawn in Group C alongside Trinidad and Tobago and Guatemala.

The top four teams in the 12-team tournament will qualify for the FIFA World Cup to be played in Mexico this June.