October 26 – Jamaica’s womens crew, and not using a single participant from their stand-out 2023 World Cup squad, misplaced their first 2024 W Gold Cup qualifier 2-1 away to Panama on the Estadio Rommel Fernandez in Panama Metropolis.
For the Jamaican federation and its more and more controversial president Michael Ricketts the consequence and its implications level to an abject failure of their responsibility to their soccer neighborhood, their girls’s crew, and in the end to the regional governing physique and its girls’s competitors programme.
For a very long time, with the scores tied at 1-1 after Jamaica took an early lead, it appeared as they might maintain on to a draw, nevertheless it wasn’t to be. The highlight on the JFF’s embarrassment was to not be saved.
Panama substitute Lineth Cedeno scored within the 84th minute to offer Panama to a 2-1 win and put them prime of Group B in League A of the Nations League with six factors and another sport to play – Jamaica away in November.
For the Jamaicans, they have to now win their subsequent three video games to robotically qualify for the inaugural 12-team W Gold Cup that may see eight groups from Concacaf be a part of with 4 from Conmebol in southern California in February and March 2024.
The highest three groups in League A’s three teams go straight via to the finals, with the second positioned groups incomes a play-off with a League B group winner. Jamaica presently aren’t even in a play-off slot.
Jamaica’s girls are essentially the most profitable crew on the worldwide stage in Caribbean soccer historical past, having certified for 2 consecutive World Cups, the one Caribbean nation to ever have achieved so. In 2022 they got here third within the Concacaf W Championship.
On the Girls’s World Cup this summer season in Australia/New Zealand the Reggae Girlz made the final 16 earlier than dropping to Colombia by a aim. Lower than two months later they had been competing within the Concacaf play-off for a slot on the 2024 Olympics, in the end dropping the two-legged tie to Canada 4-1 on combination. Now they sit backside of their group in W Gold Cup qualifying.
They’re a confirmed pressure competing on the highest worldwide stage – if their main gamers will prove for them.
Days earlier than the Panama qualifier the gamers from the Jamaican 2023 World Cup crew mentioned they’re withdrawing from two upcoming W Gold Cup qualifiers due to “fixed mistreatment” by their federation and incomplete fee of World Cup bonuses.
Non-payment and under-funding of the ladies’s crew has been a defining hallmark of Ricketts reign as JFF president.Jamaica’s girls have needed to continuously to self fund or depend on the generosity of philanthropists like Cedilla Marley, even when certified for World Cup finals.
Not even FIFA’s a lot vaunted elevated prize cash and centrally funded participant charges have made their method to the Jamaican girls.
In a press release on Saturday crew members mentioned they’ve nonetheless not obtained “full and proper” fee for his or her World Cup efficiency or bonuses for qualifying for that match.
“Whereas this has been one of many hardest selections we now have needed to make, we really feel it’s essential to take such a drastic stance to place an finish to the fixed mistreatment we obtain from the Jamaica Soccer Federation,” learn the assertion.
However the Reggae Girlz say their dispute isn’t just about cash. The gamers accuse their federation of poor communication, complaining they’d solely discovered the id of their new coach three days earlier than they had been as a result of report back to camp, after which solely through social media.
“Now we have handled this lack of communication, poor group, poor administration and delayed funds from the JFF time and time once more. For these causes, we take our stance in solidarity with hope to finish this cycle of mistreatment.”
Concacaf stored the sport scheduled and Jamaica turned up with an 18-player squad cobbled collectively from home and US faculty gamers by new coach Xavier Gilbert. Concacaf look like selecting up the payments.
Jamaica now return residence for his or her second group sport towards Guatemala the place solely a win will maintain them in rivalry for computerized qualification. Guatemala shared wins with Panama within the first two group matches.
Shorn of their stars Jamaica for the second sport – together with standout striker are Kadeja Shaw – Jamaica’s federation look like taking part in a sport of rooster with its main girls’s gamers. To date it’s backfiring on them.
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