Bermuda 2 Cuba 0

Bermuda recorded a huge victory over Cuba to secure a remarkable fifth position out of sixteen teams in League B at the Concacaf Girls Under-15 Championship in Trinidad & Tobago yesterday.

In a clash the between the best two runners-up from the four groups, central midfielder Nila Samuels — who was given a chance with Evans Welch, the team’s top scorer with three goals rested — opened the scoring in the seventeenth minute after Cuba failed to deal with a Daley Outerbridge corner.

Milan Gibbons-Thomas added the second with a brilliant turn and shot ten minutes into the second half.

It was a massive victory for Bermuda since Cuba entered the match unbeaten from three outings in group E. The Cubans finished with seven points but lost out on goal difference to Honduras, with the two having played to a 2-2 draw.

Bermuda’s win was a huge morale-booster for Don Vickers’s side after suffering their only loss of the tournament less than 24 hours earlier in group F – 3-0 to Dominican Republic – which shattered their dreams of making it to the semi-finals.

Vickers was delighted to end the tournament on a high note and praised the players for quickly recovering from the previous day’s defeat.

“It was a good way to bounce back from a disappointing loss to Dominican Republic,’’ the coach told The Royal Gazette.

“I thought the girls were brave to try and play football and build out of the back, control the middle of the park and look to finish chances when they had them.

“I thought it was a good performance from us in light of who we played, so I’m really proud of my team.

“The girls put the work in and it’s good that they got rewarded. Losing to Dominican was a little disappointing; however, they came back strong against Cuba.

“After that loss, we spoke about playing for our pride and representing Bermuda, and that’s the only thing we focused on.”

With Welch given time off, it was a chance for other players to shine for the team, and they did.

“We made some changes and those players changed the team a little bit, and it clicked really well,” Vickers said.

“Nila Samuels, Tayte Glasgow and Miyari Trott, they all came in and did quite well. Nila played in central midfield, she did really well in distributing the ball for us.

“She kept things nice and simple for us, allowing us to build-up, so it was good to see her get rewarded for her persistence and commitment to the process.

“Milan scored a really good goal. She’s a strong and fast player, she utilised her speed throughout the game and really took advantage of her power, turned and slammed the ball home.”

The coach attributed the team’s success to lessons learnt from last year’s Caribbean Union Girls Under-14 Challenge Series, held in Antigua and Barbuda, where Bermuda lost 1-0 to Guadeloupe in the semi-finals.

“A lot of the girls who played in that under-14 tournament are on this team as well,’’ he added.

“We also had a group of girls that went on to play for the under-17s who came back into this team, so we had a nice build-up experience wise.

“We would have loved to go on to the next rounds, but they finished off the tournament very well.

“Throughout the tournament, the players took to what we’re trying to do. Our game model, which is something that we stressed to them how we want to play and how we want to develop the players.

“Other than the Dominican match where I’m not sure what happened, throughout the tournament, they stuck to the game model. We only conceded once after the first game, which was good, so the girls really did well.”