By LeVaughn Flynn, Staff Reporter
Jamaica's technical director, Carl Brown, left, and president of the Venezuela Football Federation, Rafael Esquivel, are all smiles at yesterday's press briefing at the Jamaica Football Federation's office in New Kingston. - Ricardo Makyn / Staff Photographer
VENEZUELA HAVE their sights set on victory and advancement up the FIFA rankings ladder when they tackle hosts Jamaica at the National Stadium in an international friendly at 7:30 p.m.
"With Jamaica ranked 50 and Venezuela ranked 48 this match is very important," the Venezuelan press chief, Alejandro Chacon, said at a briefing yesterday at the Jamaica Football Federation's office in New Kingston.
"This game is very important for us. Jamaica is a good team and will give us a good fight and we need these games for practice because we plan to be in Germany in 2006."
The team, along with coach Richard Paez, did not attend the press conference as they had arrived later than planned and were at their hotel resting.
STILL ON A HIGH
Venezuela are still on a high from their 3-0 thrashing of Uruguay on March 31 and had a noticeably large entourage of football officials and administrators and several Venezuelan media men.
President of the Venezuelan Football Federation, Rafael Esquivel, represented the team at the briefing and said that the side was expecting a highly competitive match.
Both teams played last in Caracas, Venezuela last April where the home team won 2-0. National technical director Carl Brown said the team that will face Venezuela is an improved one from last year and as such the result should reflect that.
"It's a different set of players than the team that met Venezuela last year." Brown said. "This team is more mature and experienced."
Like Venezuela, Jamaica are stepping up their World Cup preparations. This is the third friendly international the Boyz have played in three months.
After the 2-0 defeat to Uruguay on February 18, Jamaica gave up a 2-0 lead at halftime to draw 2-2 with Honduras on March 31. While hinting that the present squad is more talented than the team he was with at the 1998 World Cup, Brown said that the '98 Reggae Boyz functioned more as a team.
"We have a far more talented group of players now than the group that went to World Cup in 1998. The only difference is the group of 1998 spent almost four years together playing as a team whereas this nucleus has been assembled two or three days before games and that makes a big difference," he said.
JAMAICA (from) Donovan Ricketts, Aaron Lawrence, Claude Davis, Ian Goodison, Tyrone Marshall, Craig Ziadie, Damion Stewart, Garfield Reid, Gerald Neil, Damien Francis, Richard Langley, Micah Hyde, Andrew Williams, Cornel Chin-Sue, Jermaine Hue, Johnnathan Williams, Fabian Davis, Barrington Hayles, Ricardo Fuller, Damani Ralph and Marlon King.
VENEZUELA: Manuel Sanhouse, Oswaldo Vizcarrondo, Gobanny Rivero, Juan Fuenmayor, Leopoldo Jimenez, Miguel Mea Vitali, Pedro Fernandez, Daniel Noriega, Juan Arango, Leonel Vielma, Javier Toyo, Andres Rouga, Jorge Rojas, Renier Rodriguez, Hector Gonzalez, Ricardo David Paez, Alexander Rondon, Alejandro Moreno, Massimo Margiotta, Javier Villafraz. Coach: Dr. Richard Paez.
