Reggae Boyz U19 games in Duesseldorf

by frog

1. game on thursday evening: Reggae Boyz - Fortuna Duesseldorf 0-1 Pictures
Reggae Boyz seemed to me a little to be a little tiered after a 15 houres journey and arriving 19 houres before theire first kick-off. But everybody was happay and awake ;-) at the training before the match. Obviously it was to cold at 5 degrees celius and straight rain. The rain stops at the kick off at quarter past seven but it was getting colder during the match. Fortuna is not a championship-favourite, they played a well orginized defense and have one strong guy in the offense. Reggae Boyz with 80% ballpossession during the match, but no big chance until the last 5 minutes. Fortuna scored in the middle of the second half and was lucky when Austin (?) missed a big shot seconds before the final whistle. Reggae Boyz should have won this match with one more day to before the tournament.
Team: R. Thompson - J. Taylor, Findlayson, Howard, Wolfe, Priestly, Myton, Shelton, West, Austin, Reid. Subs in the second half: in: Bernard, D. Thompson, Wong - out: Findlayson, Howard, Myton

2. game on saturday high noon: Reggae Boyz - Borussia Dortmund 1-1 Pictures
Friday was day off, because of easter-holiday in germany. This was a really nessecary day for the Reggae Boyz, because it looks like a complete different team on that day. Dortmund is twice as strong as Fortuna and much more experienced as a team. It was starting to rain with the kick-off, cold as yesetrday. But the Boyz find their way through a strong Dortmund midfield and Priestly scored more or less surpriesingly (of course not for me! :-). The game had lots of little fouls on both sides, but the referee only uses his whistle to give Dortmund the ball. He was really home-blinded at all. Dortmund could equalize the game on one of this funny referee-decions, a free kick from 18 meters with a little confusen in Boyz-defense.
Team: Robinson - J. Taylor, Howard, Wolfe, Priestly, Myton, Shelton, West, Austin, Reid (11th is missing, Moodie?). Subs - in: Findlayson, Spence, D. Thompson - out: Priestly, Myton, West

3. game on sunday morning: Reggae Boyz - Bayern Munich 1-0 Pictures
Because Fortuna beat Dortmund surprisingly 1-0 on saturday afternoon (i didn´t see that one) Fortuna was no. 1 in the 3-teams-group. Dormund and the Boyz were equal with points and goals, so they throw a dice or a coin or whatever to set the groupplaces. The offical plan was a little confusing (to me...), so i don´t know if the Boyz played Bayern as No. 2 or 3. Dosn´t matter anyway. Bayern played like travelling from Kingston directly to the ground - like fallin asleep. The Boyz, concentrated and fit right from the kick-off, scored after six Minutes - West is the best! :-) This "wake-up-call" for Bayern meant actualy that they made 15 corner-kicks, no chances for the Bayern-offense gettin through the Boyz-defense within the game. Two of the corners were followed by a good header flying nearby the Boyz-goal, but everything else was in Thompsons save hands. On the other side a big chance for Priestly in a one-on-one situation with the Bayern-keeper and an offside-goal. Well, i don´t know, if it´s a right or wrong decison, cause i couldn´t see anything, but it was wrong. :-) The referee give Bayern again a few more chances with his little whistle, but this time this doesn´t matter anyway.
Team: R. Thompson - Bernard, J. Taylor, Howard, Wolfe, Priestly, Shelton, West, Wong, Austin, Reid. Subs - in: Spence, D. Thompson - out: Howard, Shelton (i couldn´t see a third sub?)

4. game on sunday eve: Reggae Boyz - Bayer 04 Leverkusen 0-0, 4:5 a.p. Pictures
Bayer 04 won the cup last year, so this was a tough rival in reaching the semi-final. The game started fast and very competetive with the Boyz in the defense. With very fast players at the right and the left wing Bayer 04 put a lot of pressure on the Boyz. With some, lets say "unlucky" tacklings (not unfair, cause they always hit the ball, too) of the Boyz the game was getting rough. One player of Bayer 04 had to be exchanged cause of a hit by a straight Boyz-leg in the box. The referees decission: a indirect free-kick from 12m distance. Some minutes later again a rough tackle of a Reggae Boyz made the Bayer 04-bench gone wild. "You destroy our players." was one of the nice sentences - spoken in english by a Bayer-offical. They had some in german, too, but i won´t translate this ones here. Think of something like "motherf***ers" and you are nearby. Besides this trashtalking the game was realy exciting, in the second half the Boyz were gettin more offensive and worked out some good chances. But on both sides the ball was only a few inches to the posts, not inside. Finally the penaltyshooting has to decide and the Bayer-team was the lucky one, the keeper made a good save on the last one.
Team: Robinson - Bernard, J. Taylor, Howard, Wolfe, Priestly, Shelton, West, Wong, Austin, Reid. Subs - in: Moodie, Myton, R. Taylor - out: Howard, Wolfe, Wong. Penalty-kickers: Priestly, Shelton, West, Austin and Reid, who was the unlucky one.

back row left to right: Ryan Thompson, Rodolph Austin, Jermaine Taylor, Keneil Moodie, Ricardo Taylor, Rafe Wolfe, Luton Shelton, Kieron Bernard, Ralston Robinson
front row left to right: Dean Thompson, Duran Myton, Merrick Howard, Ricardo Cousins, Mitchly Waul, Akeem Priestly, Howard Wong, Wade Spence

Movies

Reggaeboyz sing a song while warming up in Düsseldorf
best quality - mpg-file
warm_singing (35 MB)

poor quality - mpg-files

Warm up (1.6 MB) +++ Halftime (664 kb)

Penalty 1 (144 kb) +++ Penalty 2 (88 kb) +++ Penalty 3 (64 kb) +++ Penalty 4 (72 kb)

Downunder (384 kb)