Na­tion­al coach Derek King faces more than a com­fort­ing re­sult against Cu­raçao when the teams meet at 6 pm Thurs­day (Oc­to­ber 1) af­ter­noon at the Es­ta­dio Ergilio Ha­to, Willem­stad, in Group A of the CON­CA­CAF Na­tions League.

Af­ter loss­es to Haiti and the Do­mini­can Re­pub­lic in their last two match­es, King and his charges face the po­ten­tial of rel­e­ga­tion to League B if they fin­ish fifth and/or sixth in the group.

Both na­tions shared the points when they met twice in the fi­nal round of the FI­FA World Cup Qual­i­fiers last year, play­ing to a goal­less tie at the Hase­ly Craw­ford Sta­di­um in Sep­tem­ber 2025 and then 1-1 in Cu­ra­cao in Oc­to­ber last year.

King’s ap­point­ment as a re­place­ment for Dwight Yorke as the coun­try’s head coach is yet to pro­duce goods. He des­per­ate­ly needs to snap his string of loss­es in his next two match­es, start­ing tonight, and again on Oc­to­ber 4 against the same team (Cu­raçao) at the Hase­ly Craw­ford Sta­di­um in Mu­cu­rapo, and needs to be at least among the top four teams in the Group, which in­cludes Haiti, the Do­mini­can Re­pub­lic, Cos­ta Ri­ca, Nicaragua, and Cu­raçao.

King’s men are with­out a point so far. He told the me­dia on Sun­day at a post-match press con­fer­ence that his play­ers have not been tak­ing ad­van­tage of the chances they cre­ate at match­es, not­ing that it was the dif­fer­ence be­tween the teams in Sun­day’s dis­ap­point­ing 2-1 loss to the Do­mini­can Re­pub­lic on home soil.

In their first match, King’s charges squan­dered a 2-1 ad­van­tage to lose 3-2 at the Sabi­na Park in Ja­maica on Sep­tem­ber 24. And as his team oc­cu­pies the po­si­tion in the group, he faces a wider pool of un­avail­able play­ers due to in­jury, sus­pen­sion, or un­avail­abil­i­ty.

Fol­low­ing on a hair­line frac­ture to winger Tyrese Spicer against the Haitians, King suf­fered fur­ther loss­es of mid­field­ers Daniel Phillips of Steve­nage FC and Wayne Fred­er­ick II of the Col­orado Rapids, both giv­en march­ing or­ders by Grena­di­an ref­er­ee Re­on Radix against the Do­mini­can Re­pub­lic for dis­sent.

King is al­ready wel­com­ing the re­turn of de­fend­er Ko­bi Hen­ry, who was un­avail­able for the first two match­es, as well as mid­field­er Mo­lik Khan. King al­so in­formed the me­dia that fin­ish­ing strong in the group is cru­cial for his team, giv­en the po­ten­tial con­se­quences.

Both Cos­ta Ri­ca and Nicaragua have al­so lost their two open­ing match­es and face rel­e­ga­tion. The Cos­ta Ri­can, once a pow­er­house in the re­gion, went down to Cu­raçao 4-3 and then Haiti 2-0. The Do­mini­can Re­pub­lic de­feat­ed the Nicaraguans 3-2, and Cu­raçao then crushed them 6-1. Cu­raçao then crushed them 6-1.

TEAMS

Trinidad and To­ba­go

1 Jabari Brice, 4 Ja­heim Joseph, 8 Daniel Phillips, 11 Levi Gar­cia, 13 Re­on Moore, 14 Wayne Fred­er­icks II, 15 Dan­taye Gilbert, 17 Justin Gar­cia, 18 An­dre Ram­per­sad, 19 Rio Car­dines, 23 Noah Pow­der, 21 Jahiem Wick­ham, 22 Den­zil Smith, 2 Deron Payne, 5 Ne­veal Hack­shaw, 6 An­drew De Gannes, 7 Ryan Telfer, 9 Daniel David, 10 Luke Phillip, 12 Sher­vohnez Hamil­ton, 16 Michel Poon Angeron, 20 Re­al Gill.

Coach: Derek King

Cu­ra­cao

Goal­keep­ers: Eloy Room (Mi­a­mi FC), Kiyani Zeggen (AZ Alk­maar), Tyrick Bo­dak (Vitesse)

De­fend­ers:Ar­man­do Obis­po (PSV Eind­hoven), Ju­rich Car­oli­na (Bo­rac Ban­ja Lu­ka), Roshon Van Ei­j­ma (Ki­fisia), Ju­rien Gaari (Ab­ha), Sher­el Flo­ranus (PEC Zwolle), Shu­randy Sam­bo (Burn­ley), Joshua Brenet (Kay­serispor), Li­vano Comene­cia (FC Zurich)

Mid­field­ers: Nicky Souren (SC Cam­bu­ur), Jun­in­ho Ba­cu­na (Gaziantep FK), Le­an­dro Ba­cu­na (Igdir FK), Tyrese Noslin (Barns­ley), Tahith Chong (Sheffield Unit­ed), Nigel Thomas (Ado Den Haag), Ar’jany Martha (Tel­star),

For­wards: Jearl Mar­garitha (SK Bev­eren), Je­re­my An­tonisse (Ki­fisia), Ken­ji Gorre (Mac­cabi Haifa), Jor­di Pauli­na (For­tu­na Dus­sel­dorf), Ju­r­gen Lo­ca­dia (Tamp­ba Bay Row­dies),

Coach: Dick Ad­vo­caat