BASSETERRE, St. Kitts, Aug. 05.2018 – DESPITE a valiant effort from the home side, the St. Kitts-Nevis Boys Under-14 team could not stave off a 2-0 defeat by Antigua and Barbuda yesterday (Aug. 04) at Warner Park.
Playing before a vociferous crowd of home supporters, Antigua and Barbuda struck first when they broke the deadlock in the 45th minute through a strike from Alexander Moodie Stuart.
Dajaun Bartey added the second in the 80th minute giving his side a dominating victory.
Coach of the Antigua and Barbuda team, Desmond Bleu said his players stuck to the game plan and that allowed them to come away with the win.
“We had a short space of time working with the unit, but we had a good crop of players and a few good weeks of hard training, technical work and also our tactical things we would have implemented in the game, and the guys stuck to the game plan,” the coach said.
Head coach of the St. Kitts-Nevis team, Delvin Harris said after the game that the experience was a learning curve for the team, since he believed his unit did well, despite the loss.
“If you look at the number of opportunities they had and based on the situation we faced early where (our goalkeeper) go an early red card, that is something that normally would have the players to bow their heads. If anyone was out here watching, you could have seen that the guys played and continue to put out the effort.”
Speaking to the tournament, the coach intimated that the tournament came at an opportune time, as the Caribbean Football union saw it fit to have the game ahead of the CONCACAF tournament.
“What we are using this for is to jump start our team that we will take to Florida for the Concacaf U-15. This is a fairly young team, fairly new team. Most of them have not played on the international level before so this tournament gives us a chance to assess them and see what we need to adjust,” Coach Bleu added.
In the other game from Saturday, Dominica saw of Montserrat 2-nil, with Joshua St. Jean netting in the 8th minute while Ariel Lawrence scored in the 30th minute.
On Monday, Dominica will play St. Vincent and the Grenadines while St. Kitts and Nevis will tackle Montserrat. Matches begin at 2pm at the Warner Park
