By Audley Boyd, Assistant Sport Editor 
Fuller (left) and Gardner (right)
JAMAICA'S FOOTBALL is being celebrated. It's now up to the real architects of the celebration, the Reggae Boyz, to swing the party with a grand 'Office' show against El Salvador this evening.
Kick off is set for 6:00 p.m. for the friendly international, the feature of a double-header to be opened in serious fashion between the Under-23 outfits from Jamaica and Guatemala that are chasing a spot in next summer's Olympics in Athens, Greece.
The Jamaicans have drafted most of their top players for the clash with US-based pros Andy Williams and Damani Ralph, who only arrived yesterday after their MLS semi-final, the last among a huge band of overseas-based stars at technical director Carl Brown's disposal for their first international home assignment since beating Paraguay 2-1 in July.
Williams numbers among a small group of players who represented Jamaica at the 1998 World Cup Finals in France, a historic feat which marks the reason for today's celebration.
It was on a Sunday afternoon in the middle of November of 1997 that Jamaica drew 0-0 with Mexico at the National Stadium to seal their qualification for France '98. This is the anniversary.
Joseph 'Sepp' Blatter, president of FIFA and one of his deputies, Austin 'Jack' Warner, who is also the CONCACAF and CFU boss, are among the special guests.
Like it was on that memorable day exactly five years ago, Ian 'Pepe' Goodison, Ricardo 'Bibi' Gardner, Deon Burton, goalie Aaron Lawrence, Theodore Whitmore and Williams are still members of the Reggae Boyz cast.
Whitmore, who scored both goals in Jamaica's only World Cup finals victory (2-1) against Japan, is now the team leader and though he and exciting striker Ricardo Fuller are also good for thrills and the occasion begs for it, team boss Brown says they will seek a greater measure from this encounter - preparation for upcoming qualifiers for the 2006 World Cup.
"The group we have here has been assembled in the last three or four games, most of the players who we have here will be on show on Sunday," said Brown.
"The fact that they've been assembled in the last three, four matches, you see the whole harmony and togetherness in the team growing. Therefore it's important that we use games like this to bring the players closer."
He added: "El Salvador is probably one of the teams that we'll play during the final stage of qualifiers so it's a good match now for us to know where we are at the moment in regards of the qualifiers which start in June."
The team's captain expressed a similar sentiment, but added an important point, saying: "Most of the players are based in England. The English system is different from how we play here. It's best if we can get them to come here some times and play because most of our World Cup qualifying games are not going to be in England."
Whitmore, who played in the country's past two matches, when they lost 1-0 to Brazil and 2-1 against Australia in London, added: "We're going to have situations where the best pitch that you might play on might be the National Stadium because when we go to say St. Kitts or St. Vincent for instance ... they are not going to be used to those pitches. Things that they would be able to do in England they're not going to be able to do here so these games are very useful."
How much measure they will get from the El Salvador team is uncertain as the Central American team is completely different from the one which participated in the Gold Cup in July where they lost 2-0 to the United States, 1-0 to Martinique and 5-2 to Costa Rica.
These results are certainly not inspirational and if their ambition to fill one of several possible open spots on the national team are at a similar level, El Salvador might just be what the doctor ordered for a Jamaican treat.
Teams:
Jamaica: Donovan Ricketts, Ian Goodison, Claude Davis, Ricardo Gardner, Theodore Whitmore, Micah Hyde, Jamie Lawrence, Kevin Lisbie, Ricardo Fuller, Aaron Lawrence, Cornel Chin-Sue, Shane Crawford, Fabian Davis, Gerald Neil, Jermaine Hue, Jermaine Johnson, Richard Langley, Deon Burton, Fabian Taylor.
El Salvador (from): Santos Ayala, Jaime Medina, Cristian Lopez, Enio Mendoza, Oswaldo Ardiles Argueta, Jose Orellana, Oscar Ramirez, Carlos Lopez, Selvin Gonzalez, Jose Garcia, Mario Armando, Osman Arteaga, Carlos Nerio, Juan Leiva, Salvador Penate, Mauricio Campos.
