Former Bermuda captain Dennis Brown says he knew from the moment the Island's World Cup players stepped onto the National Sports Centre pitch against Antigua on Sunday, something was missing.

From his observation, the players didn't appear to have the pride and determination one expects from those representing their country.

"A lot of people will probably look at the coaches and say they did this or that, but to see the guys coming out onto the pitch, it just seemed they lacked a bit of enthusiasm,'' said Brown, who left for home two hours later a deeply disappointed man.

The 1-1 final result meant Bermuda were eliminated from the World Cup on the away goals rule after the first leg ended 0-0.

"To play at home there should be more passion, but they lacked a bit of passion and the desire to get the job done. I noticed it one time,'' added Brown.

"At the end everyone looks at the coaches but players have to take a lot of responsibility, too.'' It's understood that only half a dozen squad players turned up for a training session last Thursday, and Brown said that was inexcusable. "At one of your last training sessions before a big match on the weekend, you get only a handful of guys showing up to training...that's not acceptable.'' Brown was a member of the 1992 World Cup squad but has since retired and moved into coaching. He coaches league team Wolves and the BFA have already recognised his talents, offering him an opportunity share the under-23 coaching duties with Mark Trott.

Already some of those players, namely John Barry Nusum, Stephen Astwood, Kofi Dill, Tokia Russell, Jemeiko Jennings and Rohaan Simons, have broken into the senior team, and more could follow.

"The under-23 team that we have right now -- and this is coming from Mark and Robert (Calderon) -- is probably the best of the talent that we have,'' said former national coach Gary Darrell.

"Many of those players are actually under 20, so in six years they will be about 26 and this may be the group we need to target. We have to decide where we want to go and set some long term goals with some intermediate goals.'' Brown agreed. "The under-23 players are more receptive to learning and they are more enthused about getting to the next level,'' he said.

"Once players get to a certain age and to different levels, the enthusiasm starts to go and the desire to train starts to go.

"Things have to be put into place whereby when guys are not committed, we have to start to do without them. We have to put in players who want to represent the country and give their all every time.

"We definitely should start looking at the under-23s. Most of the guys in the under-23s are basically between 18 and 20, so by the time the next World Cup campaign comes up in four years' time they'll be more experienced and mature to deal with pressure situations.'' Through the absence of English League professionals Shaun Goater and Kyle Lightbourne, coaches Calderon and Clyde Best looked to two teenagers in Astwood and Nusum to lead the Bermuda attack against Antigua.

"We have a number of strikers in Bermuda but a lot of these guys for personal reasons didn't want to be involved in the programme,'' said Brown, who felt the BFA should have demanded that Goater and Lightbourne be released from their English clubs.

"These guys have a job to do but like all the other countries, we had to demand our players.

"Like Calderon said, we played Russian Roulette with this situation and it came back to haunt us. With a competition of this magnitude you have to play your best players every single time. Every opposition are not going to be like BVI.'' Antigua proved a much tougher prospect, even moreso after Bermuda took the lead in the 61st minute. The visitors played some of their best football after that and an eerie silence fell over the stadium when they equalised in the 74th minute.

"Right after we scored Antigua really picked up their game and I don't think we recognised that,'' said Brown. "The difference between this campaign and the '92 campaign was that the crowd was like a 12th man to us, even when we came out to warm up. We could have taken the game to them a bit more yesterday.

"We created a few chances but we just didn't put them away.'' Dennis Brown: `The players have to take a lot of the responsibility.'