Capturing the first win in over three years, is the only option for Cláudio Garcia, head coach of the Cayman Islands national men’s football team as his squad travels to their first match of the 2023-24 CONCACAF Nations League.
The Cayman team will kick off competition in Group B, under League C, against the home squad, US Virgin Islands, on Thursday, 7 Sept. – a winnable match, according to Garcia.
“We want to dominate the game,” Garcia told the Compass during a training session on Saturday, 2 Sept. “We are not going there just to participate in the group.”
The last two games where they faced USVI, in 2019, Cayman won both times, by 2-0 and 1-0, and they haven’t recorded any victories since.
Judging by the FIFA world rankings, Cayman, which is ranked 193, is favoured to secure victory again, when they play USVI this week, who are currently unranked.
“We are going for the victory, that’s the main objective [and] the only result we have in mind,” Garcia added.
Players change but goal remains the same
Cayman national squad
1 ALBERTINI HOLNESS
2 LACHLIN LAMBERT
3 ALEXANDER CLARKE
4 JOSHEWA FREDERICK-CHARLERY
5 WESLEY ROBINSON
6 JABARI CAMPBELL
7 CASEY MCLAUGHLIN
8 JAH DAIN ALEXANDER
9 CAMERON GRAY
10 RASHAAD POWERY
11 JONAH EBANKS
12 JORDAN BONILLA
13 MATTHEW SUBERAN
14 SEBASTIAN MARTINEZ
15 TREY EBANKS
16 ELIJAH SEYMOUR
17 JAMES EBANKS
18 CHRISTOPHER REEVES
19 DIMETRI DOUGLAS
Many key players will be missing from the squad, including Gunnar Studenhofft, Mason Duval, Mark Ebanks, Syrus Connolly and Jacobbi Tugman.
“We would like to have all of them available but some of them have circumstances that are out of our control,” Garcia said.
During a 28 Aug., interview with Alfredo Whittaker, the Cayman Islands Football Association president admitted that the players who would give Cayman the best chance of winning national games are absent from the squad.
“Something like that, yeah,” Whittaker said, while blaming clubs for not releasing the players.
Filling the vacancies in the team will be youth players, who were recently called up, according to Garcia.
“We’ve been adding some new players,” the coach said. “Some [of our] former youth 20 players which has the quality to be at the senior level,” noting that the team is charged with a good mixture of experienced players that will ensure diversity.
One of those players adding depth to the squad is long-time Caymanian footballer Casey McLaughlin, who told the Compass that he and his teammates are aiming to get off to a good start.
“The camp started really intense,” McLaughlin, 27, said. “We have the goal to win the group and we hope to obviously start off with our strongest foot forward.
“Once we group together and really discuss the matches coming up, we can find it within ourselves to grind out the results.”
Garcia admitted that morale has been low among his players ahead of their USVI fixture, but he is trying to lift the team’s spirits and remain focused on the task at hand.
“Of course there will be some ups and downs during the preparation, but at this point, my job is not to focus on that part. I want to focus on the field and training and bring the mood of the players up,” he said.
The Cayman Islands vs USVI Nations League showdown will be broadcast live and on-demand exclusively with Paramount+ and CBS Sports. CONCACAF will also have highlights from the game on their Facebook and YouTube pages.
Following their match against USVI, the team will have a chance to play in front of a home crowd four days later, as Cayman will welcome Aruba to Truman Bodden Sports Complex.
Related Videos
Has the USVI team ever won a match in CONCACAF?.