“Preparation has been going great! Over the past eight weeks, we were able to work on the different aspects of the game, and have seen great improvement from the girls.”
That was an assessment proffered by Akilah Castello, Head Coach of the National U17 Women’s Team, in an invited comment to this publication as countdown commences to that team’s participation in the 2020 CONCACAF Women’s Under-17 Championship first-round Qualifiers in Curacao, from August 17 to 25.
Guyana National U-17 Women’s Team
Castello said the 20-person players’ contingent would comprise eight players from the team’s international base and 12 from the 17-person local squad that trains four days a week at the GFF’s National Training Centre.
She was optimistic about Guyana’s performance at the qualifiers. “We are expecting positive results from this group, along with our international-based players who’ve been preparing as well for this…competition. We have some good talent in the likes of Jalade Trim, Shamya Daniels (and) Samantha Banfield who played in the last U15 championships, and Janea Knight who also played both in the U15 and U20 levels; who, we believe, will seek to make valuable contributions at this level.”
Akilah Castello, Guyana U17 Women’s Head Coach
According to CONCACAF, there will be 32 participating teams. Qualifiers comprise the lowest-ranked 16 teams, based on the CONCACAF Women’s Under-17 Ranking as of July 2018, where the top-finisher of each group will advance to the knockout stage of the championships. These teams are: Anguilla, Antigua & Barbuda, Bahamas, Barbados, Belize, Bonaire, Cayman Islands, Curacao, Dominica, Guyana, Honduras, Martinique, Saint Kitts & Nevis, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent & the Grenadines and US Virgin Islands.
The remaining 16 teams, consisting of top-ranked teams based on the CONCACAF Women’s Under-17 Ranking as of July 2018, will participate in the Finals Championships. Each has been placed in one of four groups: E, F, G and H, and will play in a round-robin tournament, following which “the top three finishers in each of the groups would join the winners of Groups A, B, C and D (from the qualifiers) in the round of 16”, according to CONCACAF.
The 16 teams participating in the group stage of the Final Championship are (in alphabetical order): Bermuda, Canada, Costa Rica, Cuba, Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Grenada, Guatemala, Haiti, Jamaica, Mexico, Nicaragua, Panama, Puerto Rico, Trinidad & Tobago and the United States.
The knockout stage of the competition – round of 16, quarterfinals, semifinals and final — would be played in its respective stages entirely in a single match elimination format, with the finalists and third place finishers automatically qualifying for the FIFA U-17 Women’s World Cup 2020.
Guyana has been placed in Group ‘D’, along with the Bahamas, Curacao and St Vincent and the
Grenadines, and is scheduled to play on the following days at the Stadion Ergilio Hato Willemstad:
MATCH 1: 21st August – Curacao vs Guyana @ 20:30hrs
MATCH 2: 23rd August – St. Vincent & The Grenadines vs Guyana @ 18:00hrs
MATCH 3: 25th August – Guyana vs The Bahamas @ 17:00hrs
