ANTOFAGASTA, Chile – If Thursday’s professional performance is anything to go by, then the signs are positive.

That was the consensus among the contingent here after the Reggae Boyz completed their near 90-minute workout on one of the two well-presented outside facilities at the Estadio Regional Calvo y Bascunan.

They were greeted by a huge media contingent upon arrival at the venue, with Leicester City’s Wes Morgan, Michael Hector of Reading FC, and Giles Barnes of Houston Dynamo selected to grant interviews, along with head coach Winfried Schaefer.

The press was granted 15 minutes and was able to watch the warm-up session, but was then asked to vacate the premises, as police officers, on the instruction of the Jamaican management team, patrolled the outskirts of the venue removing unwanted videographers and photographers.

However, like the previous day when a drone circled for a few minutes as the players enjoyed a light workout designed for recovery at the Parque Juan Lopez, some ingenious pressmen ventured atop nearby high-rise buildings to capture whatever images were available to them. They were spotted by the police officers and were duly removed.

But the Boyz weren’t perturbed and gave their most impressive performance on the pitch since arriving in Chile.

“The players looked sharp, hungry and ready to go out there and do the job, and it was one of them where today was the last real hard training. Tomorrow we take it down a bit and on Saturday we just go out and do our best,” noted Captain Rodolph Austin.

And regarding the quality of the session, Austin added: “Definitely, the effort was great. In fact, from we came here. I know the type of players that we have. We have a good professional squad so it’s good.”

And regarding his own fitness, having missed Tuesday practise game after suffering from the flu, he explained that he was still not a hundred per cent fit, but would be willing to give of his best nonetheless.

“It was okay, but my body still feels a bit weak and stuff, but I just tried to get some football under my belt.”

After the warm-up session what appeared the likely starting side was taken through a half field game, an event in which they totally dominated scoring a number of goals in the process without conceding. Vancouver Whitecap striker Darren Mattocks, who lacked sharpness against Cobreloa FC on Tuesday, was in spanking form, hitting the net two or three times, while Barnes and Simon Dawkins were also on target. Austin and Jobi McAnuff also got decent strikes on goal, keeping Ryan Thompson a busy man.

Dwayne Miller started in goal and was guarded by Wes Morgan and Michael Hector at central defence, with Kemar Lawrence on the left and Adrian Mariappa on the right. Austin and McAnuff anchored central midfield, with Garath McCleary, who continues to look sharp and skilful, operating from the right flank and Simon Dawkins from the left. Barnes played as a withdrawn striker to Mattocks.

After some time, Dawkins was replaced by Lance Laing on the left and Thompson replaced Miller in goal.

Schaefer was pleased with the effort, as the players executed some of the plans specifically designed for the Uruguay, the 15-time champions of South America.

“The players were very concentrated in training and at the team meetings, they talk together and the spirit is very good. We have no Messi, we have no Neymar, we have no Ronaldo, but we have a good team,” he said.

“Everybody knows that we can only have a chance (to do well against quality teams) when we lose the ball and the strikers become the first defenders,” he added.

The German coach is fully aware that he’s guiding a team considered a major underdog in this tournament, but he remains adamant that “when our team play we can make problems for Uruguay, but when Uruguay have the ball we should give them only chance from the wings”.

He noted that Uruguay tend to play on the counter-attack and provide long passes forward to key striker Edinson Cavani. The South American’s other frontline striker, Luis Suarez of Barcelona, is suspended for the tournament following on his biting incident against Italy’s Giorgio Schiellini at last year’s World Cup Finals.

“Before we watched the match against Venezuela where we had many good things and many bad things. We realised that when we lost the ball the field was too big (players wide apart), the team was not compact and the organisation was not good, so we talked about this and we also analyse Morocco playing against Uruguay where the Moroccans made very good pressure against Uruguay.

“We talked about it together because I wanted to hear from the players what they were thinking so that they know what to do, so today’s training was to exercise this. When we lose the ball we get directly behind the ball, everybody, and we have to stop the counter-attack. Uruguay are a good counter attacking team. They have good defenders in one-on-one and in the air, but they are not very quick, so we want when we win the ball we have to play the first ball very quickly for Mattocks, for McCleary and Giles, that is our tactics and today we practised in a small field and I think it was okay,” Schaefer explained.

To close the session the head coach managed shooting drills, while assistant coach Miguel Coley guided the defenders as they simulated handling long diagonal balls.

“It was about maintaining our shape, being compact and holding the team together as we moved from side to side,” he said.

The team is expected to train at the match venue tomorrow.