Head Coach praises Vincy Heat’s comeback

Theon Gordon, who has dual responsibility as Director of Technical Matters of the St Vincent and the Grenadines Football Federation, as well as Head Coach of the Senior Men’s Team- Vincy Heat, has praised his charges for their comeback in two international friendlies versus Dominica.

Hosting the Dominicans at the Victoria Park on Thursday May, 2, 2024, and Sunday May 5, 2024, the Vincentians were defeated 3-1 in match one, but rebounded to beat the visitors 2-0 in match two.

A goal mouth scramble during last Sunday’s friendly international between Dominica and St Vincent and the Grenadines at the Victoria Park

Oryan Velox had scored for the home team on Thursday night, before Chad Bertrand and a double from Audel Laville, gave Dominica the come from behind win.

But on Sunday afternoon, second half substitute, Steven Pierre, used his pace to good effect to register the brace that gave the Vincentians a relief.

Summing up the team’s efforts in the two matches, Gordon said: “ They took responsibility for the first match…they recognized where we could be better and tried to build in the second match and the results showed, despite we basically featured two teams in both matches as

we sought to give everyone some playing time”.

Despite the “commendable” display from the Vincentians in front of home support, Gordon admitted that the team is far from where it ought to be ahead of their assignment in June, when they will kick off their 2026 FIFA World Cup Qualifiers.

“ We are not where we want to be, hence, we have a lot of work to…It is quite difficult for us to play at the moment because, locally, no one is really playing top level competitive Football, given that it is over a year now they have not played major games to get the match sharpness and that physical and mental readiness , since we had a National Club Championships.”

Gordon, though, said that he and his technical staff are trying to make the best of the situation by being innovative.

“It is trying to keep them motivated by just training, and this is quite difficult, so what we have done is try to fashion the training into a tournament style, where we have the zones coming in playing on the weekends, but the numbers have not been as good.

“…we need to have competitive Football so that the players can get sharper, but we continue training; we should be getting some players coming in to see what they have and hopefully get in one friendly before our first match,” Gordon related.

St Vincent and the Grenadines playing in Group F, will face off against El Salvador, Suriname,

Puerto Rico and Anguilla during the June 2024 and June 2025 Fifa windows.

In the June, 2024, window, St Vincent and the Grenadines will be away to Suriname on June 5, and host El Salvador at home on June 9, 2024.