Paul Hall, the interim head coach of the Jamaican national senior men’s team, has come out in support of the move to cancel the friendly international against South American giants Uruguay slated for June 11 — in the middle of three games in Concacaf Nations League fixtures.

The Reggae Boyz were scheduled to play the game in South America, but Concacaf stepped in last week and cancelled the fixture, saying “Jamaica’s team in the Concacaf Nations League would be compromised due to the proximity of the dates and the distance the team would have to travel between the competitive fixtures,” a release from the Jamaica Football Federation said.

On Friday, Hall agreed with the decision, citing its proximity to a crucial game against Mexico.

“Although it’s a game that we wanted to play, I don’t think it’s the game that you wanted to play between Suriname and Mexico; it’s too far to travel and it’s not ideal.”

Hall, who was responding to a question from the Jamaica Observer during a virtual press briefing ahead of today’s Nations League match against Suriname, said: “You want to be going into the Mexico game with your players not having played three days before, so for me, it’s a game that we want to play as they are world-class, but, hopefully, somewhere later in the calendar when we are not too busy.”

The schedule would have seen Jamaica play Suriname Saturday and Tuesday, then fly to Uruguay for the game on June 11 and back to Kingston for the game against Mexico three days later.

Despite their heavy 0-6 loss to Catalonia recently, Hall said that was the quality of opposition they want to play all the time, and said it would not affect their preparation for the Nations League.

“For me it was a fantastic game, fantastic game, and I wish we can do it even more,” Hall said. “It showed us what world-class looked like and we saw how far away we were from a Catalonia team where the players could easily have played for Spain, every single last one of those players” he said.