Montesso hails WC draw

Jermaine Lannaman, Gleaner Writer

Reggae Boyz assistant coach Alfredo Montesso says he is satisfied with the draw for the semi-final stage of CONCACAF's World Cup (WC) qualification which will see Jamaica going up against long-time rivals the United States.

The high-profile draw took place in Brazil at the weekend along with the draw for other confederations.

"It is a good draw, as despite the presence of the United States and the possibility of Guatemala joining, we have a good chance to advance from the group," said Montesso, shortly before the national Under-23 team's departure for the first round of Olympic Games qualifiers in Suriname yesterday.

"It also means that now we know who we will be going up against, we need to start stepping up preparations, as although the United States and us are favoured to advance from the group, it will not necessarily be easy.

"Recent FIFA world and confederation tournaments show that teams are catching up in terms of their abilities, and as there are virtually no easy games, so we will have to be fully prepared and ready if we want to make it to the next stage," he added.

Jamaica, who have never defeated the United States at the senior level, are likely to face Guatemala and Haiti given the latters' favouritism to advance as winners of Group E and F in the preliminary stage of qualifiers, which is slated to start on September 6.

Guatemala's group includes Grenada, St Vincent & the Grenadines and Belize, while Haiti's consist of Antigua & Barbuda, Curaçao and the US Virgin Islands. Both Haiti and Guatemala were quarter-finalists at the recent Gold Cup tournament in the United States.

The semi-final stage, which is slated to start in mid-2012, will see the winners and runners-up of each of the three contesting groups of four teams each advancing to the final stage of the qualifiers.

Qualifying efforts

This stage will consist of six teams, who will play each other on a round-robin basis, and will see the top three teams gaining automatic qualification to Brazil.

The team finishing fourth will earn a play-off with a team from the Oceanic confederation for another opportunity to qualify.

Jamaica, who in their qualifying efforts will be led by technical director Walter Gama, head coach Theodore Whitmore, and assistant coaches Montesso and Luciano Gama, failed to qualify for the South Africa 2010 World Cup after bowing out at the semi-final stage.

Back then the team lost out to Mexico and Honduras, who eventually qualified for the 2010 World Cup.