KINGSTON, Jamaica — Former National Reggae Boyz assistant coach Jerome Waite is refusing to give up on the chances of his new charges at St Jago High advancing in the ISSA/Digicel Manning Cup, despite their 0-1 loss to Jonathan Grant in the Spanish Town Derby on Monday.

Following on the 2-2 draw in the opening game of the season against STATHS, St Jago dropped three more points to find themselves languishing in Group A.

St Jago conceded with five minutes to go in a typical derby match against Jonathan Grant and were unable to find an equaliser despite throwing everything they had at their rivals in the final few minutes.

For Waite, who took charge just a few weeks before the start of the season, it is part of a learning process which both he and his new young players must go through.

“It’s always a learning process and a work in progress. Majority of them can play more than one season.”

Waite is promising to stay the course and see how well he can mould the team during the rest of the season.

“The fact that we started late with these youngsters, we have to continue and see how well they can gel and how far they can go.”

He acknowledged that it was a defensive error that cost them the game.

“It was an error in the defensive unit that resulted in the goal, but it was basically a spirited game.”

Waite says he will be focusing on the mental side of things to help his players navigate the rest of the season.

“We still have a couple games to play, so we have to continue to work and see how best we can build these players’ moral and move forward. We will get them back (mentally), despite the loss.”

Waite believes that there is still enough time in the season to get something valuable from it.

“This is only our second game. We have more games to play, so we are going to continue working.”

St Jago will get another opportunity to secure three points for the first time this season when they face Excelsior High at the Stadium East on Friday starting at 3:00 pm. 

Dwayne Richards