SAN JOSE, Costa Rica — Jamaica’s National Senior Reggae Boyz went into their crucial CONCACAF World Cup qualifier against Costa Rica with the right mindset, but somehow, generally, they appeared to have misplaced their energy which led them to a huge 3-0 defeat inside Estadio Nacional de Costa Rica on Tuesday night.

That’s the view of Head Coach Winfried Schaefer, who has admitted that his charges must now defeat Panama in Panama City in September if they are to keep hopes of advancing in the 2018 FIFA World Cup Finals in Russia alive.

“From early we were not very concentrated and that resulted in the first goal, which was a signal for everybody — Costa Rica and us — and from there we couldn’t find our game. We ran, we fought but we didn’t play (team) football and we lost too much power from that,” he told the Jamaica Observer at game’s end.

“We played every time in the pressing zone of Costa Rica and that made it very easy for them to play,” he added.

The German coach revealed that he changed the system to a 3-5-2 formation at half-time when he introduced Jermaine Taylor for Lee Williamson and Darren Mattocks for Demar Phillips, and that they were able to plug the left side of the field and got more players in front of the ball in attack.

However, he was unhappy with the number of individual play which was easily blunted by the home side. “But we ran too much with the ball (dribbled) and that was not good enough; we can play better,” fumed the coach.

“We lost the ball too often and then had to fight to get it back. It was not our day today, but I don’t want to talk too much about individual players; we will make an analysis of the match and when we meet together again we discuss it and see what we have to change, but not now. it is too difficult now because nobody is happy — not the players, not the coach.”

Schaefer said that the team did a very good job pressing the Central Americans in last Friday’s game in the National Stadium, “but today we were too open and we made it too easy for Costa Rica”.

Still, as he had said prior to kick-off, he doesn’t believe that the war is over. In fact he believes qualification will go down to the very last match in this tight group where Costa Rica now lead with 10 points, three ahead of Panama who are also three points ahead of Jamaica. Haiti prop up the four-team table with one solitary point.

Only the top two teams will advance to the final round of qualifying to include six teams, from which the top three earn automatic berths to Russia, and the fourth-placed team enters a continental play-off for another chance to qualify for Russia.

“For me it is not finished and we have to beat Panama, that’s why we play football. We have to learn from this match. I’m sure we can go in Panama and get a result,” reiterated Schaefer.

“Everybody wanted to win this match, but the way (method) was not good and we tried to encourage them to play football.”

Prior to resuming World Cup qualification series, the Reggae Boyz will be engaged in Copa Centenario in the United States from June 3 through to 26 and Schaefer believes that, like last year, this will present the team an opportunity to regain its solidity and chemistry.

“The Copa Centenario is very important because we need all players and maybe new players, and then we will have time to build a team and then this team can go to Panama and beat them,” he said.

But between now and then, there will be anxious moments as the Reggae Boyz ponder their future in the 2018 FIFA World Cup Finals campaign.