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Jamaica rolls while Honduras settles for draw in Gold Cup action

JamaicaGreneda (Getty)

By JONATHAN VERA

CARSON, Calif – The Gold Cup came to the Home Depot Center Monday night as Jamaica trumped Grenada, 4-0, while Honduras settled for a scoreless draw against Guatemala despite being two men up.

Luton Shelton scored the opening goal for Jamaica in the 21st minute. Rodolph Austin took the shot from the right flank, Shelton weaseled his way into the six and toe poked it in off the half volley.

Jamaica struck again in the 39th minute when San Jose Earthquakes striker Ryan Johnson finished off a cross from New York Red Bulls midfielder Dane Richards. Later in the second half, Johnson had a sure goal taken away.

The shot was blasted from the top off the penalty arc, went off the crossbar and bounced down clearly inside the goal line before trickling out. The match officials missed the call, ruling that it wasn't a goal.

Jamaica, however, found redemption soon after when Demar Phillips scored with 10 minutes left to play in the game. Minutes later, Omar Daley sliced one into net to give Jamaica the landslide victory.

The Honduras-Guatemala contest did not follow in their predecessors’ footsteps, but rather exhibited a back-and-forth chess match, as Los Catrachos couldn't take advantage of Guatemala being reduced to nine men.

Midfielder Oscar Garcia earned the best scoring chance for Honduras in the 33rd minute. Garcia blasted a shot from 25 yards out that rang off the crossbar and planted itself behind keeper Ricardo Jerez.

Guatemala had their set of chances but unfortunately fell short-handed in the final third of the game. Gustavo Cabrera received his second yellow of the game and was ejected.  

In the last 10 minutes, Guatemala saw another player sent off after Henry Medina was issued a second yellow for a reckless tackle.

Despite being two men up, Honduras failed to capitalize on their found fortune. Though the Guatemala backline was strong, it was the Honduran lack of chemistry that was their ultimate folly.

“I think what most affected us was the fact that the recent additions from those players coming from Europe,” said Honduran coach Luis Fernando Suarez. “We had three weeks training session with the local players and those are the ones in best shape right now. We saw that and just trying to integrate those players from Europe was a challenge.”

As for Guatemala, it was the same old story. Los Chapines could not keep 11 players on the pitch, but they still found solace in the draw.

“It was really difficult for us, but in the end the result was good for us,” said Guatemala and Philadelphia Union striker Carlos Ruiz. “Guatemala in the past has played one game good and the next game bad. So we’re trying to play more games good. We’re trying to get more confident every game we play, we’ll see if we can do it in the next game.”

The Reggae Boyz will take on Guatemala, and Honduras will clash against Granada June 10 at FIU Stadium in Miami in the next round of Group B play.

Comments

  1. Doo be honest, given our stereotypes is it likely we’ed expect anything else? I would argue that the high score was due to Jamaica having totally smoked the competition, which was made easier by the fact that Grenada (not Granada, by the way, that’s either a city in Spain or Canada’s bizarro world good twin) totally made a hash of their opportunities.

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  2. But then we will never get a strong region it will just be the same thing over and over. The gold cup has only recently expanded to involve this many CONCACAF teams before we would invite others in time. Some of these smaller nations will improve but limiting the amount games they play will only make that take longer.

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  3. It’s hilarious how Guatemala always reverts to the same M.O. in the last 20 minutes of international games. They must get intensive training in fouling, rolling around in agony, time-wasting…. At least it’s funny when it isn’t the U.S. on the receiving end of it.

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  4. The extent to which MLS has helped the Jamaican team progress cannot be understated, but it’s still a pretty big hit not to have Ricardo Fuller in the line-up.

    I’d love for Jamaica to evolve to be one of the main rivals to break the USA-MEX complete domination of this federation. It needs some shaking up.

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  5. That’s concacaf.com’s M.O. for their live streams and highlight reels. I actually enjoy it, hearing the crowd let’s you feel one step closer to the action.

    MLS/US announcers feel they need to fill every second of the 90 min with their hot air – this is a welcome reprieve. They all think they’re doing radio or something with the need to describe everything as if we can’t see it (Marcelo Balboa).

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  6. This is the bit I dislike about this tournament, but there’s no way to fix it.

    The first four matches: 5-0, 5-0, 4-0, 0-0.

    No regional tournament should be a blow out like that. There’s such a disparity in our region that it’s embarrassing. Might as well go straight to the quarters and save countries the hassle of just getting creamed every two years.

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  7. If you don’t like the articles on this website, the don’t visit it. I doubt anyone is forcing you to log on. And based on the quote “back and forth chessmatch”, and the fact that there were no goal descriptions, I think its a safe assumption that the score was 1-0. You can now comment on my run-on sentence professor.

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  8. I noticed there was no audio on the concacaf stream last night. Anybody know if USA v Canada will be the same tonight? Determines whether or not I go to a bar 🙂

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  9. Honduras got robbed by some poor officiating. That first red card was a terrible call. Honduran player made a dramatic clearance (all ball) and a Guatemalan player came in late and flopped around enough holding his calf that I guess the ref thought the Honduran guy must have caught him.

    Hope something like that doesn’t happen to us this month…

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