‘We never followed it up’

DESPITE A win that earned them a place in the final round of Concacaf World Cup Qualifiers, Reggae Boyz head coach is not a happy man.

The Reggae Boyz earned their place in the final round with a 1-0 win over British Virgin Islands, a result that belies the difference in ranking between the two.

The British Virgin Islands, who McClaren had previously said can be dangerous, are ranked 207th on the FIFA world rankings — there are only 210 teams on the list.

The Reggae Boyz, who are ranked 63rd, were expected to steamroll the minnows at the A.O. Shirley Recreational Ground on Road Town in the British Virgin Islands, but the reality was far from the expectations.

Warner Brown rose high from a Demarai Gray free kick in the 17th minute of play to open the scoring, and all seemed to be going according to plan.

However, there was no second or third, or the six that some were expecting, given the differences in the team.

McClaren, who had called for the team to be ruthless against the BVI, wasn’t surprised.

“Nothing surprising. We’ve watched them for a couple of games and the new coach is trying to get them playing in a good style; nice defensive block and trying to play through on transition. So the game plan … congratulations to them,” said McClaren during a press conference after the game.

Still, the man in charge was not happy, saying that he would not place the blame for the largely anaemic performance on circumstances that were obvious.

“I thought they made it very, very difficult for us. The opponent and the pitch combined together and didn’t allow for what we call free-flowing football,” he said.

“But we’re not making no excuses, we should be better than that.”

As the game wore on, and even as Jamaica enjoyed the lion’s share of possession and chances in front of goal, there were some hair-raising moments, with goalkeeper Andre Blake called into action to snuff out the possibility of an equaliser.

“We needed to score a second goal and we didn’t do that. So we’re always going to be nervous in the last 10, 15 minutes,” McClaren explained.

The performance is worrying, given the expected improvement in opposition, beginning as early as tomorrow at the National Stadium when Jamaica takes on Guatemala in the final game of the round.

“We know inside the dressing room that we can be better and we need to be better next year, in the next couple of hours with a game coming up. We’ve got to be better than we were today in terms of attitude,” said McClaren.

“We have to learn from this and we have to move on quickly, because Guatemala will be a totally different proposition, and we need to give a better performance in terms of that one.”

But what has McClaren delivering a wry smile is the chalk-and-cheese difference between the way the ‘shortstaffed’ Reggae Boyz performed and the near full-strength squad he had available on Saturday.

“Maybe we came here with a little bit of complacency and that showed in our slow play,” he said.

“We’ve done well in the previous two games in terms of performance and results. We didn’t follow it up today and that’s the biggest disappointment for me, that we never followed the performance that we had last week.”