‘Hey, Mon Hope You Can Take the Heat’
Blue skies, swaying palm trees, bougainvillea in full bloom, the crash of Caribbean surf on unspoiled beaches . . .
The howl of 30,000 or more sun-baked fans seeking nothing less than an American defeat on a bumpy field almost devoid of grass.
There are tourist views of the tropics and then there is reality.
When the U.S. national soccer team arrived on this balmy but wind-swept island Friday night, it was not without a certain sense of dreadlock. The foreboding runs deep.
Anything less than a victory today over the “Reggae Boyz,” as Jamaica’s national team has come to be called, would be a setback for the United States in its quest to reach the 1998 World Cup in France.
A tie might be acceptable, however, given the conditions.
Gamesmanship is everywhere in evidence.
The U.S. team bus from the airport to the hotel was loaded with pitchers of fruit juice for the enjoyment of the American players. The drinks went untouched . . . just in case.
After the U.S. team trained at the National Stadium on Saturday afternoon, the players were delayed for half an hour in getting back to the hotel for showers when their bus was “accidentally” blocked in by other vehicles, including trucks delivering plastic chairs to the stadium.
The game was purposely set for noon today, a time when the average temperature is 92 degrees.
“The point is, it’s a psychological war, how much you can interfere with the balance of the opposing team,” said Rene Simoes, Jamaica’s well-traveled Brazilian coach.
“At 3:30, when games are usually played, the temperature is 90 degrees, so there is not much difference. But when you put the game at 12 o’clock, you change everything in the United States camp.
“You are saying, ‘Hey, prepare yourself. Jamaica awaits you.’ So it is a message. . . . The game is not all on the field. Respect us. We are here [in the final six] not by accident. We are here because we have worked very hard. Don’t consider us Third World, because this is football.”
The Americans heard and responded, training at noon in similar heat in Florida. But the rest of today’s conditions could not be duplicated.
The stadium, for one, will be unlike any they have experienced. Opened in 1962 by Britain’s Princess Margaret in honor of Jamaican independence, it has seen better days. Signs prominently displayed outside warn visitors that they use the facility at their own risk.
Capacity is said to be between 30,000 and 33,000, but tickets, ranging from $15 to $75, still were being sold Saturday evening. As many as 40,000 could be crammed into the stadium, which, since it is undergoing “reconstruction,” offers no restroom facilities whatsoever.
The U.S. locker room Saturday afternoon resembled a storage closet, “but it will be ready tomorrow.” The larger-than-usual U.S. media contingent (about 18 American writers and photographers) is being seated in the sun on the sloping, cracked velodrome track that surrounds the field.
Forget telephones or televisions for instant replay; the journalists have been told to bring hats to ward off the sun and water to prevent dehydration. They have also been told to arrive no less than three hours before kickoff.
“Come tomorrow, you are going to be faced with an atmosphere that you have never before experienced,” said Horace Burrell, president of the Jamaican Football Assn. “[It will be] very, very great for football. People cheering, but peaceful. You won’t have problems. Believe me. Jamaicans are sports-loving, they understand football. The DJs will be there before the game, building the hype, playing a lot of music, Bob Marley, Shabba Ranks. It’s going to be like a carnival. So be prepared.”
The Jamaica-U.S. game and the Mexico-Canada match in Mexico City on Sunday are the first encounters in a final double round-robin qualifying group that also includes Costa Rica and El Salvador.
To qualify for France ‘98, it is necessary to finish in the top three among those six countries.
Mexico seems sure to do so. The United States is likely to do so. The other berth is up for grabs, and right now it is the Jamaicans doing the grabbing.
Under Simoes, a Groucho Marx look-alike with a Bora Milutinovic personality, the islanders have done better than ever before in reaching CONCACAF’s final six, but whether they can make this last step and become one of the North and Central American and Caribbean region’s teams in France is difficult to say.
On paper, the United States is the better team.
On the field, the Americans still have to prove it.
“We know that we have a good opponent in Jamaica,” U.S. Coach Steve Sampson said Saturday. “We know that we have our work cut out for us.”
(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)
World Cup ’98
* WHAT: World Cup ’98 qualifying match.
* WHO: Jamaica vs. United States.
* WHERE: National Stadium, Kingston, Jamaica.
* WHEN: Today.
* TELEVISION: Channel 34, noon (delayed following Mexico-Canada qualifier at 10 a.m. PST).
* AT STAKE: First of 10 qualifying games this year for United States, home and away against Jamaica, Canada, El Salvador, Costa Rica and Mexico. Top three countries advance to France ’98.
* NEXT GAME: Versus Canada at Stanford Stadium, Palo Alto,
March 16.
