By Nodley Wright, Staff ReporterTHEY NEITHER recorded a win nor scored many goals, but Jamaica's Under-20 footballers were still the toast of the SpVgg Oberndorf tournament in Germany.
The Young Boyz, which are due to return home from the eight-team tournament tonight, according to technical director Carl Brown, were the most popular team on show.
"We were clearly the most popular team in the tournament," Brown told The Gleaner on Saturday. "We had a large following wherever we went.
"I believe it is a combination of the fact that we are Jamaicans and the fact that we played well," explained Brown.
It appears as if the spectators were not the only ones taking note as the party achieved one of its objectives, that of earning an invitation to next year's tournament.
"We have impressed the organisers because they have already made plans to invite us to next year's tournament. So we have achieved the objective of being invited again," a pleased Brown said.
While he was pleased with that, Brown was not fully satisfied with the results. In four games they lost twice and drew twice.
In Saturday's two games played with 25-minute halves, the Young Boyz drew 1-1 with Brazil's Botafogo and 0-0 with Vitesse Arnhem of the Netherlands.
"The experience so far has been good. The first game we lost 0-3 to Germany's Freiburg largely due to nerves," said Brown.
"We gave up two goals in the first 10 minutes but then settled down," he continued.
NUMEROUS CHANCES
"As usual we got numerous chances to score but wasted them, especially in the second half and on one occasion Rafe Wolfe had an open goal and rolled the ball wide," the disappointed coach said.
The games against Botafogo and Vitesse Arnhem were no different.
"We totally outplayed Botafogo but drew 1-1 with them. Again the problem was that we squandered a number of chances. Botafogo scored first in the second half but we equalised on the stroke of full time through Dean Thompson."
Thompson, Brown said, followed up on good work by left back Merrick Howard and Akeim Priestley. Howard, according to Brown, starting the move at left back and fed Priestley who worked his way to the outside of the 18-yard box before firing. That effort rebounded into play for Thompson to follow up and finish.
The Young Boyz played their final game yesterday against Atletico Madrid of Spain. Dean Thompson scored to earn Jamaica a 1-1 draw but they lost 5-4 on penalties.
Luton Shelton, Nicholay Findlayson, Wade Spence and Ricardo Spence converted their penalties. Howard missed his penalty for both teams to be locked at 4-4, forcing the teams into sudden death. At that point Howard Wong failed to convert.
The tournament was won by Arsenal (England), Germany's Stuttgart finished second and Botafogo ended third.
