NIGEL SI­MON

Se­nior Mul­ti­me­dia Re­porter

nigel.si­mon@guardian.co.tt

Cana­di­an-born strik­er Mal­colm Isa­iah Shaw of Cana­di­an Pre­mier League strug­glers Atléti­co Ot­tawa is among six un­capped over­seas-based play­ers named by So­ca War­riors coach An­gus Eve in a 60-man pre­lim­i­nary squad for the 2023 CON­CA­CAF Gold Cup in the USA.

This af­ter the 25 men’s se­nior na­tion­al teams par­tic­i­pat­ing in the com­pe­ti­tion be­gin­ning with the pre­lim­i­nary round on June 16 sub­mit­ted their pre­lim­i­nary ros­ters to CON­CA­CAF ahead of the start of the com­pe­ti­tion which runs un­til Ju­ly 16, 2023, and will crown the re­gion’s best na­tion­al team.

Ac­cord­ing to tour­na­ment rules, all play­ers’ names in their re­spec­tive coun­try’s fi­nal 23-play­er ros­ters must come from their pre­lim­i­nary lists sub­mit­ted.

In ad­di­tion to Shaw, 27, the un­capped over­seas play­ers short-list­ed in­clude for­mer T&T youth play­ers, Eng­land-born mid­field­er Rio Car­dines of Crys­tal Palace; USA-born mid­field­er Mic­ah Cain (TSV Meer­busch/Ger­many), and the Cana­di­an-born trio of de­fend­er Luke Singh (Ath­leti­co Ot­tawa/Cana­da), mid­field­er Kris­t­ian Lee-Him (IFK Es­kil­stu­na/Swe­den), and goal­keep­er Ja­heim Wick­ham (Toron­to FC/Cana­da) while Eng­land-born Michael Ked­man of Dan­ish club Aal­borg BK, who made his lone ap­pear­ance against Nicaraguan in the CON­CA­CAF Na­tions League last year was al­so called up.

With a must-win pre­lim­i­nary round clash against Guade­loupe set for June 16 at DRV PNK Sta­di­um, in Fort Laud­erdale, USA, Eve al­so short­list­ed reg­u­lar over­seas-based play­ers in for­mer cap­tain Kevin Moli­no of US Ma­jor League Soc­cer’s Colum­bus Crew and Levi Gar­cia, who is com­ing off a very suc­cess­ful sea­son with AEK Athens in which he won both the League and Cup dou­ble.

Both men re­turn to the squad af­ter they missed out on re­cent in­ter­na­tion­als through in­jury lay­offs.

They are joined by Shel­don Bateau (SK Bev­eren/Bel­gium), HFX Wan­der­ers cap­tain, mid­field­er An­dre Ram­per­sad, Le­land Archer (Charleston Bat­tery/USA), Nick­las Fren­derup (Ran­heim/Nor­way), Aubrey David (SD Au­cas/Ecuador), Ka­reem Moses (Jaro/Fin­land), Shan­non Gomez (San An­to­nio FC/USA), Ryan Telfer (Mi­a­mi FC/USA), Kaile Au­vray (Sport­ing Kansas/USA), Tris­tan Hodge (Hart­ford Ath­let­ic/USA), Mo­lik Khan (Min­neso­ta Unit­ed/USA), Jo­mal Williams (Once De­porti­vo/El Sal­vador), Daniel Phillips (Gilling­ham/Eng­land), Samory Pow­der (Hud­son Val­ley Ham­mers/USA), An­tho­ny Her­bert (FC Ha­ka/Fin­land), Je­lani Pe­ters (Mem­phis 901 FC/USA), An­dre Ray­mond (Du­miense CJP/Por­tu­gal), Ajani For­tune (At­lanta Unit­ed/USA), his broth­er An­dre For­tune II (Nomme JK Kalju/Es­to­nia), Matthew Woo Ling (Mi­a­mi Unit­ed/USA), and Jesse Williams (Des Moines Men­ace/USA).

The lo­cal­ly-based con­tin­gent is head­ed by the ex­pe­ri­enced duo of past and present cap­tains, mid­field­er Jo­evin Jones of Po­lice FC, and goal­keep­er Mar­vin Phillip of AC Port-of-Spain along with a core of stand­out per­form­ers in the T&T Pre­mier Foot­ball League in­clu­sive of Tiger Tanks Club San­do’s Nathaniel James, the tour­na­ment’s top scor­er with 13 goals, along with his fel­low for­mer na­tion­al Un­der-20 team­mates Re­al Gill, and Kai­him Thomas, AC Port-of-Spain’s Michael Poon-Angeron, Du­ane Muck­ette, Jameel Nep­tune, and John-Paul Rochford, while La Hor­quet­ta Rangers’ duo Ataulla Guer­ra and Ross Rus­sell Jr al­so make the list with the lone ma­jor omis­sion be­ing Mal­ta-based strik­er Run­dell Win­ches­ter who fea­tured in the last CNL clash with Nicaragua be­fore his home fans in To­ba­go.

Eve was al­so forced in­to a late change to his ros­ter with Greece-based Ju­dah Gar­cia of AEK Athens re­serve team, the younger broth­er of Levi, be­fore with­drawn from the squad af­ter he sus­tained a ham­string in­jury and was re­placed by AC Port of Spain’s in­flu­en­tial mid­field­er Che Ben­ny, with the re­quest be­ing ap­proved by Con­ca­caf on med­ical grounds.

“We’ve had to make one change to the pro­vi­sion­al squad be­cause Ju­dah sus­tained a ham­string in­jury. We’ve been mon­i­tor­ing all the home-based and over­seas-based play­ers over the past few months and Che has been among the play­ers we have been ob­serv­ing.

He missed out on mak­ing the orig­i­nal ros­ter be­cause of the tight com­pe­ti­tion among play­ers for the po­si­tion he plays, but with Ju­dah now ruled out, we’ve de­cid­ed to in­clude Che as his re­place­ment,” Eve stat­ed.

The na­tion­al coach will ad­dress the me­dia next Thurs­day at a press brief­ing at the Man­nie Ramjohn Sta­di­um, Mara­bel­la be­fore the team de­part­ed for Penn­syl­va­nia a day lat­er.

Be­fore the match against the ‘Gwa­da Boys on June 16, T&T meets Guatemala in an in­ter­na­tion­al friend­ly on June 11 at Sub­aru Park, Chester, Penn­syl­va­nia, from 6 pm.

This will be the first for T&T since its 1-1 draw with Nicaragua in their must-win CON­CA­CAF Na­tions League (CNL) B Group B match at the Dwight Yorke Sta­di­um in Ba­co­let, To­ba­go, which saw T&T fail­ing to gain pro­mo­tion for the 2023/2024 CNL League A com­pe­ti­tion as well as miss out on au­to­mat­ic qual­i­fi­ca­tion to the Gold Cup and should T&T get past Guade­loupe it will meet the win­ner of the Guyana/Grena­da clash for a spot in the Group D of the main draw along­side top-seed­ed Cana­da, ranked 47th in the world, 116th-ranked Guatemala and Cu­ba, ranked 165th.

T&T qual­i­fied for the Gold Cup pre­lim­i­nary qual­i­fiers as a League B sec­ond-place fin­ish­er with French Guiana, Guade­loupe, and Guyana, to­geth­er with League A third-place fin­ish­ers Cu­raçao, Grena­da, Mar­tinique and Suri­name, and League C group win­ners Puer­to Ri­co, St Kitts and Nevis, St Lu­cia, and Sint Maarten.

The pre­lim­i­nary round one fix­tures be­tween Mar­tinique and St Lu­cia and Cu­ra­cao and St Kitts and Nevis will al­so take place on June 16 at the DRV PNK Sta­di­um in Fort Laud­erdale from 7 pm and 9 pm, re­spec­tive­ly.

A day lat­er (June 17), at the same venue, the three re­main­ing first-round pre­lim­i­nary match­es will come off with French Guiana against Saint Maarten from 4.30 pm fol­lowed by Suri­name ver­sus Puer­to Ri­co at 7 pm and two hours lat­er, Guyana up against Grena­da.

In the sec­ond round of the pre­lim­i­nar­ies, the win­ner of the Mar­tinique/St Lu­cia match and the win­ner of the Suri­name/Puer­to Ri­co clash will square off for a place in Group C along­side the Cen­tral Amer­i­can trio of Cos­ta Ri­ca, Pana­ma, and El Sal­vador while the third and fi­nal pre­lim­i­nary round pair­ings see Cu­ra­cao and St Kitts and Nevis win­ners meet­ing French Guiana and Sint Maarten win­ner for a place in Group A where the USA, Ja­maica, and Nicaragua await. Group B of the main draw will fea­ture Mex­i­co, Haiti, Hon­duras, Asian Cham­pi­ons, and guest na­tion, Qatar.

T&T pre­lim­i­nary Gold Cup ros­ter

Goal­keep­ers: Mar­vin Phillip (AC PoS), Nick­las Fren­derup (Ran­heim IL/Nor­way), Den­zil Smith (W Con­nec­tion), Ra­heem Lee (Po­lice FC), Ja­heim Wick­ham (Toron­to FC/Cana­da).

De­fend­ers: Aubrey David (SD Au­cas/Ecuador), Shel­don Bateau (SK Bev­eren/Bel­gium), Le­land Archer (Charleston Bat­tery/USA), Ka­reem Moses (FF Jaro/Fin­land), Shan­non Gomez (San An­to­nio FC/USA), Alvin Jones (Club San­do), Tris­ton Hodge (Hart­ford Ath­let­ic/USA), Stephon Mar­cano (VC Fu­sion/USA), Josi­ah Coop­er (Club San­do), Ross Rus­sell Jr (La Hor­quet­ta Rangers), Michael Ked­man (Aal­borg/Den­mark), Luke Singh (Atleti­co Ot­tawa/Cana­da), An­tho­ny Her­bert (FC Ha­ka/Fin­land), Je­lani Pe­ters (Mem­phis 901 FC/USA), Justin Gar­cia (De­fence Force), An­dre Ray­mond (Du­miense CJP/Por­tu­gal), Josi­ah Trim­ming­ham (Club San­do), Jesse Williams (Des Moines Men­ace/USA), Noah Pow­der (un­at­tached),

Mid­field­ers: Jo­evin Jones (Po­lice FC), Daniel Phillips (St John­stone FC/Scot­land), Ryan Telfer (Mi­a­mi FC/USA), Michael Poon-Angeron (AC PoS), Nathaniel James (Club San­do), Kevin Moli­no (Colum­bus Crew/USA), Levi Gar­cia (AEK Athens/Greece), Re­al Gill (Club San­do), Ne­veal Hack­shaw (Oak­land Roots/USA), An­dre Ram­per­sad (HFX Wan­der­ers/Cana­da), Kaile Au­vray (Sport­ing Kansas/USA), Mo­lik Khan (Min­neso­ta Unit­ed/USA), Samory Pow­der (Hud­son Val­ley Ham­mers/USA), Ka­reem Ri­ley (Club San­do), Jameel Nep­tune (AC PoS), Kevon God­dard (De­fence Force), Mic­ah Cain (TSV Meer­busch/Ger­many), Ajani For­tune (At­lanta Unit­ed/USA), An­dre For­tune II (Nomme JK Kalju/Es­to­nia), Nathaniel Gar­cia (Point Fortin Civic), Kris­t­ian Lee-Him (IFK Es­kil­stu­na/Swe­den), Matthew Woo Ling (Mi­a­mi Unit­ed/USA), Ataulla Guer­ra (La Hor­quet­ta Rangers), Du­ane Muck­ette (AC PoS), Luke Phillip (Club San­do), Re­on Moore (De­fence Force), John-Paul Rochford (AC PoS), Justin Sadoo (De­fence Force), Kai­him Thomas (De­fence Force), Jo­mal Williams (Once De­porti­vo), Che Ben­ny (AC PoS).

For­wards: Mal­colm Shaw (Atketi­co Ot­tawa/Cana­da), Isa­iah Gar­cia (Point Fortin Civic), Rio Car­dines (Crys­tal Palace/Eng­land), Nicholas Dil­lon (Club San­do), Kadeem Corbin (La Hor­quet­ta Rangers).