COUVA, Trinidad & Tobago — In two rugged back-to-back games, Jamaica’s Under-17 Reggae Boyz have earned the praise of their coach, Andrew Edwards, who has not always been so generous.

He was not gracious and did not mince words when he lashed the Young Boyz for their below-par performance in their opening Group A game of the Caribbean Football Union (CFU) finals where they beat Bermuda 6-2 last Friday.

Two days later, the Jamaicans were tested by a slick-moving Haitian side in a 0-0 draw, and Edwards sang their praises for a more mature and disciplined rendition.

On Tuesday night in the final game of the preliminaries, the hosts Trinidad and Tobago gave the Jamaicans a scare when they rallied from 0-2 down at the half-time break to tie the match in a nine-minute second-stanza blitz with strikes from Nion Lammy (48th minute) and Captain Jaydon Prowell (57th).

In the five-goal thriller before a noisy home support, the Young Boyz were neither shaken nor stirred by the onslaught, but kept their composure to find a late winner in minute 76 courtesy of Raewin Senior, who had scored the opening goal in the 13th minute.

Nickque Daley got Jamaica’s other goal in the 36th minute.

Tuesday’s result puts the Jamaicans into tomorrow’s semi-finals, along with Haiti, both finishing on seven points. Haiti, however, topped the group by virtue of a plus-seven goal difference compared to Jamaica’s plus-five.

They await the qualifiers from Group B, whose final set of games were due to take place at the Hasely Crawford Stadium in Port of Spain last night.

Cuba (six points) lead the group, while Curacoa and Suriname are on three points each. Last night Cuba were due to take on Suriname and Curacao to face Guadeloupe.

For a well-played first half and a gutsy second period, Edwards lifted his hat to the lads.

“We are very happy that we achieved the primary objective of qualifying for the CONCACAF stage of World Cup qualifying. And I must say the players deserve every bit of commendation that can be given.

“I know we came down hard on them after the first game, but that was very important as we cannot allow them to slack off. In that game (against Bermuda) we got a good result, but not a good performance. But we have worked on that and they now see the importance of raising their standards,” he told the Jamaica Observer.

As was the case in the US Virgin Islands in the CFU first round of qualifiers, Jamaica started the campaign shakily with a win, but got better as the tournament progressed.

“The boys did very well last night (Tuesday) and I thought we had a brilliant first half from start to finish, and we dominated that first 45 minutes where we played some beautiful, powerful and technically and tactically smart football, and all of that was good.

“The challenge now is to sustain that for 90 minutes, as you saw in the second period we came out a little bit flat, but we will have a discussion about it to see what was the cause and what we could have done better,” Edwards reasoned.

During the period when the Young Soca Warriors held the ascendancy, the Jamaican chief tactician believes his second-half substitions aided in wresting some measure of control back to his team.

Regular Captain Jeremy Verley replaced Blake White in the 53rd minute, Chadd Letts came in for injured Daley in the 65th, while Jordan Petrekin switched place with the limping talisman Kaheem Parris in the 78th.

“We made some good substitutions which brought back the parity in the game, and we were able to use our superior play in front of goal to get a third goal and finish off the game and hold on to the end.

“But we really want to commend Trinidad as I thought they played really well, as they did not fear or cower and they threw everything at us. I like the way they play and the ideas they put on the pitch,” Edwards noted.

The Portland native, who also coaches at the high school level in Jamaica, bemoaned injuries to a number of players coming out of the Trinidad contest.

“The game yesterday (Tuesday) was a very difficult game, a very physical, one and we came out on the worst end of the stick because Chad Letts needs to be medically examined and Nickque Daley, who started the game with an injury, now seems to have a new one after the numerous fouls against him, which were never called,” said the Jamaican coach.

Parris is also nursing a knock sustained from the Haiti match, and Edwards is considering sidelining all three players for the remainder of the tournament.

“We have to remember that these guys have other football commmitments, so I am not one coach who believes to win at all costs, so that could be it for them for the remainder of the tournament.

“What this does also is give other players the opportunity to show what they can do,” he added.

Five teams — the four semi-finalists and the best third-placed — will advance to the CONCACAF stage in Panama next year. And from those play-offs, four nations will progress to the FIFA Under-17 World Cup in India next summer.