Early US goal sinks Warriors

The Warriors stayed within distance of the third and fourth placed teams Costa Rica and Guatemala at the end of matches on Wednesday in CONCACAF Qualifying Zone.

TT remained on four points, ahead of Panama (two points) while Guatemala moved to seven, same as the Costa Ricans who were beaten 2-0 away to Mexico.

The Mexicans are out front with 16, one more than the US.

The Dutch coach was particularly harsh on his team for their slow start which enabled the Americans to score in the second minute.

"I was not happy but I think I could not ask more of them in the second half when we played with ten men," Beenhakker said after the match at East Hartford in Connecticut.

"We know a long time now that the United States always start strong and we made the same mistake. We knew also that our team always seems to need about 20 or 25 minutes to get in the game and I don’t know why," he said.

"We worked on it and we talked about it. But I don’t know if they need to work more on their minds or with more pressure," he added, voicing his concern about the inability to get off the mark quicker.

"The US start was killing and we also had some bad luck because when we also got into the game a bit more we lost a guy. It was a good decision from the referee and I don’t blame him," Beenhakker said.

Looking back at the performance, he said briefly: "At least we were in the game in the second half with ten guys and we had a lot of ball possession."

And looking ahead to what is now a must win match at home to Guatemala on September 3, the man in charge hopes that the players would have learnt from their mistakes.

"We learnt a lot and once again we saw that it is killing to start a match in such a way. I hope that the guys will pick it up.

We also know that we don’t have to dramatise this result because USA is very strong like Mexico which did its duty and beat Costa Rica. It means they still have seven points and we are three behind. We still have it in our hands," Beenhakker said.

With no time to settle, the TT faithful were scratching their heads and goalie Kelvin Jack admitted that he was left shell-shocked when a mishap on the right back position allowed Bobby Convey to score.

He pushed the ball behind Atiba Charles for Brian McBride to knick home for a 1-0 US lead. It was the beginning of a miserable first half for as goalie Jack had to perform some masterful work between the sticks to keep TT in the match.

TT took way too long to settle and just when they started to make a match of it, a bad back pass by Marvin Andrews forced Dennis Lawrence to use illegal force to prevent Landon Donovan from going clear to goal and the Wrexham defender was given marching orders.

The second half began with TT looking desperate to get back into the contest but still vulnerable with the ten men.

Kenwyne Jones who came on for Stern John, almost had a penalty call in his favour when he pushed into the left of the box and went down following a tackle but the referee didn’t see it in TT’s favour.

And Andrews narrowly missed out on a touch to a right side ball which went inches past the left post.

Convey was sent off for a second booking in the 87th minute and with an extra three minutes on the clock, TT tried in vain to steal a late point. The Warriors nest face Guatemala at the Hasely Crawford Stadium, Mucurapo on September 3.

TRINIDAD AND TOBAGO: 21-Kelvin Jack; 3-Avery John, 4-Marvin Andrews, 2-Atiba Charles (8-Scott Sealy, 46+), 6-Dennis Lawrence; 9-Aurtis Whitley, 16-Silvio Spann, 7-Christopher Birchall, 20-Collin Samuel (5-Brent Sancho, 46+); 19-Dwight Yorke (capt.), 14-Stern John (15-Kenwyne Jones, 55). Subs not used: 1-Shaka Hislop, 18-Densil Theobold, 23-Anthony Wolfe, 24-Cyd Gray

Head Coach: Leo Beenhakker

USA: 18-Kasey Keller; 4-Chris Albright, 22-Oguchi Onyewu, 3-Gregg Berhalter, 7-Eddie Lewis; 19-Steve Ralston (9-Santino Quaranta, 72), 10-Claudio Reyna (capt.), 5-John O’Brien (14-Chris Armas, 46), 15-Bobby Convey; 21-Landon Donovan, 20-Brian McBride (13-Taylor Twellman, 83)

Subs not used: 1-Tim Howard, 2-Greg Vanney, 11-Jeff Cunningham, 12-Jimmy Conrad

Head Coach: Bruce Arena.