Gordon Williams, Contributor

( L - R ) Christopher Nicholas, Keith Kelly, Anthony Bennett Left: Sean Fraser playing for Miami F.C.   CenterRight: Fabian Dawkins. Right: Shavar Thomas (left) playing for the senior Reggae Boyz in the recently-concluded Digicel Caribbean Cup qualifiers at the National Stadium.

Shavar Thomas remembers marking Rob Friend during Jamaica's football international at 'The Office' earlier this month.

"Big, strong, fast," the central defender thought of the 6' 4", 210-pound striker who had scored Canada's only goal to beat Jamaica when the teams met in early September.

"But nothing really special."

Thomas had played against Friend before, at the youth level. The last time was when he captained Jamaica's under-23s in a practice match against Canada in Florida, prior to the young Reggae Boyz's hyped, but failed, Olympic qualifying bid.

Friend, who now plays in Holland's top league, wasn't "really special" then either, Thomas said, especially when compared to players he had faced before at the 2001 under-20 FIFA World Youth Championships (WYC), a tournament the Canadian had also played in.

"Saviola, Coloccini, D'Ales-sandro," Thomas recalls. The names of the young Argentine trio rolled much easier off his tongue. They are harder to forget because he sees them often, playing for top clubs and their senior national team - even at the 2006 World Cup. Thomas remembers testing himself against current Brazilian stars Kaka, Adriano and others at under-20 too.

Yet, despite unending promises - which many players made to themselves and claim local football administrators pledged to them as well - it is hard to gather names from Jamaica's squads at the 1999 under-17 WYC finals in New Zealand and the under-20 tournament in Argentina, which have made a big impact as Reggae Boyz.

While Landon Donovan, DaMarcus Beasley and Oguchi Onyewu, all members of the United States team in New Zealand in 1999, became cornerstones of the American squad to Germany in 2006, where Michael Essien - another '99 product - also starred for Ghana, somewhere along the line most of Jamaica's WYC players slipped through the cracks.

The system that promised to nurture them for football stardom as a group had failed. Some essentially became the "Lost Boyz".

"It has to be disappointing," said Thomas. "It's obvious there is talent there because (Jamaica) made two (youth) World CupsÉ We (in 2001) had all echoed the same sentiments of being the future of the national team."

IGNORED

Instead, today, the WYC squads are largely the past. Only Omar Daley and Khari Stephenson, who played in 2001, get consistent calls for the national team. But neither one can be labeled a star or even a sure starter when Jamaica is at full strength.

Some, like defenders Sheldon Battiste of Portmore United and Alex Thomas of Arnett Gardens, who played in both WYCs, still turn out for National Premier League (NPL) clubs. But, based on recent trends, neither is close to the top of the selection pecking order for senior national duties.

Other names from the under-17 and under-20 WYC teams still pop up on local football rosters, including Kevin King, Anthony Bennett, Wolry Wolfe, Craig Gordon and Damion Williams. But a few, like promising defender Shane Stevens and gifted midfielder Kevon Harris, both targeted early as senior team prospects, reportedly live overseas and have virtually vanished from the national selection radar.

The likes of Keith Wilson, Keveral Stewart, Loren Sailsman, Reinaldo Stewart, Eshaya Bryan, Kingsley Brown, Dwayne Richards, Dane Chambers, Deshaun Woolery, Adam Wallace and Allan Reid are hardly household names in Jamaica, although they were exposed to world football more than five years ago.

Now 25, Shavar, Alex's older brother, was only recently recalled to the national fold, despite making his senior debut at 20, starting in World Cup qualifiers, and playing the last few years professionally in U.S. Major League Soccer (MLS).

Midfielder Sean Fraser, another 25-year-old who went to New Zealand and Argentina, was only called up for the Digicel Caribbean Cup qualifiers after a stellar season alongside former Brazilian greats Romario and Zinho at Miami F.C. of America's United Soccer Leagues (USL).

Fabian Dawkins, another USL player who went to the under-20 WYC with the Thomas brothers, Battiste, Fraser, Stephenson and Daley, was also part of the failed Digicel campaign. He has only been a fringe national player when all the seniors are available.

And even as Jamaica laments the drought of quality strikers, Christopher Nicholas, who played on the 2001 WYC team, and was touted as a can't miss senior prospect by coaches including Brazilian RenSimoes, this summer played the equivalent of an upgraded "corner league" in the U.S, but has yet to become a regular for Tivoli's NPL team this season.

GLARING

Possibly most glaring is the case of Allien Whittaker, who was voted the best goalkeeper of the '99 WYC tournament and was a member of the '01 team. After being injured before the final round of Olympic qualifiers, he fell way down a list of suspect net minders who would be considered for the Reggae Boyz today and recently joined the Jamaica Defence Force.

Other players who figured prominently in N.Z. and Argentina are suffering the same fate.

Keith Kelly, currently recovering from a leg injury, was a standout at both WYC. His promise earned him a professional contract with big French club Paris St. Germain as an under-17, but Kelly has made sporadic appearances for Jamaica's senior team, and has not been among the Reggae Boyz recently.

It was not supposed to be that way.

"Just being part of the programme (at the time of the WYC) all the players held that belief that we would at least get a chance or shot at the senior national team," said Thomas, who currently plays for the Kansas City Wizards.

He is not the only one left puzzled, especially after successive Jamaica Football Federation (JFF) administrations repeatedly emphasized that the WYC players would form the core of future senior teams.

"I thought they would have kept us together," said Fraser.

At least one former national coach believes the WYC players were ignored by impatient administrators eager for quick-fix solutions to ease the immense expectations that strangled the programme after the '98 "Road To France" campaign success.

"All administrations and coaches said they want to deal with youth football and that has not happened," said the ex-coach, who asked not to be named for this story.

"They give up on the youths too earlyÉ The overall problem is that none of the administrations have focused on the youth. There's a whole heap of talk."

"I think we never had a continuity programme," explained Carlton "Spanner" Dennis, the coach of Santos who has worked with young national players, including Harris and King. "We never spent enough time with the youths. We let them go astray."

EXPENSIVE

The "talk" has proven expensive too. Jamaica failed to qualify for the World Cup in 2002 and 2006. Several local and foreign coaches - some demanding hefty salaries - have come and gone. A new one is on the way.

Meanwhile, Ricardo "Bibi" Gardner is the only national player today who broke into the senior team under age 20 who could claim - legitimately - to be a star. Gardner shone as a teenager at the '98 World Cup, earning a contract at Bolton Wanderers, but he never played on the '99 or '01 WYC teams.

Today, many of the players from '99 and '01 don't even know what happened to their WYC teammates. When Shavar Thomas was asked about Stevens, his partner in defence, and Fabian Blake, another from 2001, his reply was blunt: "Honestly, I don't know."

The blame for the demise of a once promising core of young Jamaica players has been tossed in several directions. Administrators point to a poorly funded system for robbing the programme of its continuity.

Yet Brazilian Clovis d'Oliveira, who some players believed favoured the transition of the WYC players to the senior set-up as a group, was fired after failing to qualify Jamaica for the 2002 World Cup.

WYC players claim the turnover of coaching staff, featuring different and changing philosophies, added to the problem. Others said the emphasis on foreign-born players, especially from Britain, eventually destroyed the spirit of the WYC players, who believed they would never get a real opportunity to shine as seniors. A few drifted away from the competitive game by their mid-20s.

"They were looking at overseas-based players, not us," one said.

"They force you to focus on other things," explained another, who is trying to complete his studies.

Wherever the blame finally settles, it is clear Jamaica dropped the football. Coming off the success of qualifying for the finals of World Cup '98, the country was sitting on possibly its richest vein of collective talent in decades - players weaned on the same football philosophy and who had invaluable international experience playing in WYCs. Yet Jamaica has not returned to a world football tournament final stage since.

"It is for the organization in place to say these guys did not go to two World Cups by mistake," Shavar Thomas explained. "Somewhere along the line, maybe, that vision got lost."

The young Boyz did too.

HOPE

The ex-coach thinks the current JFF administration's push to build a football academy in St. Elizabeth is a huge positive that could ensure young players are given an extended run and not dumped after a few opportunities.

"(Now) a youth plays five or six games and he doesn't do too well and he is not selected again," he said.

Shavar Thomas is convinced that the experience Jamaica's players gained from WYC '99 and '01 gives them the edge over those who never had similar top flight exposure, even if they play in the NPL.

"Club football and international football are two different things," said Jamaica's 2001 WYC captain.

He added that while "in other countries if you show brilliance they channel you in the right direction, in Jamaica (success) is a hope".

So far, hope alone has not been good enough. But the JFF is wooing established coach Bora Milutinovic. Alexi Lalas, a player from Milutinovic's U.S. World Cup '94 team, claimed the globetrotting Serb likes young, smart players, and is unafraid to pick unknown names at the expense of established ones.

Players from Jamaica's WYC teams of '99 and '01 will still be in their 20s by World Cup 2010 in South Africa, Milutinovic's target. Not too late for a core of "Lost Boyz" to be finally found.

-Gordon Williams is a Jamaican journalist based in the United States.