Demoralised TT regroup ahead of W/Cup qualifier

Trinidad and Tobago’s senior footballers will be spending the next few days trying to lift their morale before leaving on Friday for their first 2006 World Cup qualifier against the Dominican Republic on Sunday. The team arrived in Trinidad on Monday following another defeat, this time a 3-0 loss to Northern Ireland at the Dwight Yorke Stadium, Bacolet in Tobago. The loss couldn’t have come at a worse time. And skipper Angus Eve has explained that he and other members of the team will now need to dig deeply to raise the team spirit. “I think what this defeat may have done was really bring us closer as a team now which is the only positive thing we could take out of it,” Eve said. “We need to be a whole lot stronger because we realise now it’s going to take a lot more to get the people behind us,” Eve said.

“Support is important to any team whether it be Manchester United or Jabloteh and in our case the national team. The results have not gone our way but after we lost out to a freak goal so early, it really hit us because our confidence level was already low after the Scotland match,” the midfielder said. “But we again sat down in a meeting and the guys are prepared to go out there and get things right for the sake of the country and others who are behind this team,” he said. Scottish-based defender Marvin Andrews, a former captain of the team, thinks that faith will see TT out of the current hole.

He said there is no doubt that TT will be outright favourites for the  qualifying tie which takes place in Santo Domingo on June 13 with the return leg scheduled for here on June 20. “By the grace of God we will come out of this. These are things you must go through to determine winners and losers and I think we still have what it takes to be winners,” Andrews said. “If we decide to stay down then it makes no sense. We are still a young team and I am confident that we can perform as we are supposed to. We need to keep having the faith because the important matches for us are really the two upcoming ones against Dominican Republic,” he said.

“Losing is never a nice feeling and while the team itself has not been playing particularly well, all talk aside, I think we can still pull out the stocks,” added the Rangers man. Coach Bertille St Clair has added North East Stars striker Jerren Nixon, Nigel Pierre, Aurtis Whitley and Devon Mitchell to the squad which will resume training this morning at the Marvin Lee Stadium, Macoya. “It is always disappointing when you lose a match especially in the manner in which we did.

The early goal set us back because we really thought that the free kick was awarded to us as the referee pointed in the direction favouring us but then all of a sudden the guy took the shot and with our defence already pushing up and the goalkeeper off his line, they got their first goal,” said St Clair. “The signal from the referee also indicated that it would be an indirect free kick which made it even more puzzling,” St Clair explained. “But in saying that we have seen our mistakes and what we need to work on and I feel we can get things in place for the qualifier on the weekend. That’s our main focus now and then we can take things from there,” he said.