Menzies wants strong U-20 Girlz squad for CONCACAF round
PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti — The Jamaica Women’s Under-20 Head Coach Hue Menzies is hoping he has the strongest possible football squad for the CONCACAF stage of World Cup qualifying scheduled for Honduras from December
3-13.
Jamaica, with a youthful squad, ended second to hosts Haiti in the just ended Caribbean Football Union (CFU) tournament. Both teams, along with third-placed Trinidad & Tobago, advanced to CONCACAF round.
The Reggae Girlz, and several other squads at the CFU tournament, were unable to field some of their best players and were short of preparation because of school engagements in North America.
But Menzies, speaking to the Jamaica Observer shortly after the 0-2 defeat to Haiti in the final at the Stade Sylvio Cator on Friday, explained that some players may become available as the college football season winds down.
“We’ll probably get some [more experienced] players to travel with us to Honduras, so hopefully we can get the full squad to represent Jamaica,” he said.
“I think any time you go into the international arena and in such an environment [in Haiti] you are going to get valuable lessons. At the CONCACAF level we would definitely want a stronger team,” he said.
He said that a preparation camp, no less than five days, is likely to precede the CONCACAF competition. But he was unable to confirm whether it would be local or in Orlando, Florida, where he operates a football academy.
“We are looking to do that (camp) but we are waiting for confirmation from the JFF (Jamaica Football Federation) and the (Jamaica women’s football) ambassador (Cedella Marley). We’ve submitted a schedule, and obviously the finance is always an issue. Hopefully we can get some sponsors to bring the Girlz in. We still are going to deal with the collegiate issue, but we’ll see how many players we can get,” he said.
Though unable to have hosted a training camp ahead of the trip to Haiti and unsurprisingly looking short of cohesion at times, the consensus from the coaching staff was that the inexperienced Girlz put up a brave fight.
Jamaica topped Group B with two wins and a draw, before beating Puerto Rico 2-1 in the semi-final. Haiti, winners of their three-team group, beat Trinidad 2-0 in the other semi-final. The Reggae Girlz had to do without injured Captain Khadija Shaw for the semi-final and final.
“It tells you the direction the programme is going in; that we can create a pool of younger players that can come in and get to the final of CFU. I thought the Girlz gave a valiant effort… obviously the youthfulness showed up in the final, but we played five games and they played four.
“We did it without Khadija Shaw which really tells a lot about the squad. We knew were going to go through adversities and we tried to use that as motivation. We feel like the tournament was a plus and it gave us an understanding and told us what players we need to get for those games,” said the Women’s Under-20 coach.