Eve: Club Sando achieved objective

Angus Eve, the coach of Club Sando, said he is satisfied his team achieved its objective of qualifying for the semifinals of the Concacaf Caribbean Cup in their debut campaign.

This was after Club Sando was held to a goalless draw by the Dominican Republic’s Delfines del Este in Group A at Hasely Crawford Stadium in Port of Spain on Tuesday night.

With this result, Club Sando secured the first semifinal ticket of the 2026 Caribbean Cup as they improved to seven points from three matches, one ahead of Haiti’s Violette AC, who faced Suriname’s SV Broki at the Dr Ir Franklin Essed Stadium in Paramaribo, Suriname, last night.

The result on Tuesday night also keeps T&T Defence Force third in the group with three points from three matches and one left to play against Delfines Del Este on September 15 in the hunt for the semifinals, depending on Violette AC’s result last night.

In Group B last night, Jamaican clubs, titleholders Mount Pleasant Football Academy and fellow Jamaicans Portmore United meet today, while Group B leaders Salcedo FC and Cibao FC clash.

At the end of the round-robin group stages, the top two teams in each pool will advance to the semifinals.

In addition to the regional crown, the Caribbean Cup offers a pathway to the 2027 edition of the region’s premier men’s club competition, the Concacaf Champions Cup.

The tournament champion, runner-up, and third-place finisher (a total of three clubs) will qualify for the 2027 Concacaf Champions Cup, with the champion receiving a bye to the round-of-16.

Speaking after Tuesday’s result, which extended his team’s unbeaten run to three matches in Group A, Eve said, “Looking at the numbers going into the game. The objective was to qualify for the semifinal and also to try and stay in contention for the top spot in the group hunting.

“So, we are still in that position because we go top of the group with the result, and we also qualified based on the points that only one team (Violette AC) really could catch us to go into the semi-final. So, overall, it’s a very historic run for the team, a very young team with an average age of about 24 years.”

He said, “The boys would have played in the first game against SV Broki (Suriname), who featured about nine Brazilian players, plus coaches, and similar in this game (Delfines Del Este), who had a lot of Colombian players, would have been on this team. So, that’s a good experience for our young players, and it augurs well for our league, which is much maligned. And for us to come second in the Trinidad and Tobago Premier Football League and put on a run like this, you know, it’s a good omen for the local football.”

Reflecting on the match against Delfines Del Este, Eve said he was pleased with the outcome of the match but was happy with the wasted chances by his players.

Eve said, “It’s been plaguing me for this whole tournament. We’ve been playing good stuff. We have defended stoutly and only conceded one goal in three matches. But the Achilles heel has been not taking the chances that we created because we’ve been creating numerous amounts of chances.”

“Any coach would want to improve on everything that he’s doing in every aspect of the game. But, at the end of the day, you know, if you tell me before the tournament started, we would be three games unbeaten and qualified for the semifinals before the last match in the league, we would take that,” said a satisfied Eve.

Moving forward, Eve said his team will be faced with a much tougher financial burden as they will have to play at least one of their semifinal matches abroad.

He said, “We are still in the same financial position that we began with at the start of the campaign, and it’s going to get harder for us because when you go into the semifinal round, it’s home and away, which we already qualified for. So, we have to find money to prepare the game here and also to travel and play abroad. So, it’s a big ask for us.”

He pointed out, “We have reached out to the businesses and companies, but no one has come on board as yet. These young men really need the support. I just read in the newspapers that there may be no support for the local league this season. So, I don’t know what these young men are going to do in the future.”

With one group match left to play against Violette AC on September 15 at the Cibao Stadium in Santiago De Los Caballeros, Dominican Republic, a likely group decider, Eve said his team is unlikely to bring in any new faces while the possibility of losing players exists. We have one long-term injury in the left back, Justin Cornwall, who picked up a knee injury in training matches and is expected to be still out.

“So, we just have literally 21 active players on the roster because, again, for financial reasons, we can’t get any more persons on board.

Eve also highlighted the difficulty in preparing his team for a tournament like this and not having the benefit of regular activity of the local domestic league.

Eve stated, “It has been extremely difficult. Our opponents, Delfines Del Este, would have already played four league matches in the Dominican Republic League, but we haven’t started, and we aren’t even getting practice matches. We had to make do with two teams from the Southern Football Association, and their league has recently kicked off as well, and the only other team that is really active with us is the Defence Force, and as you know, they were in the same group with us.”

Latest Concacaf Caribbean Cup standings

Group A

Team*P*W*D*L*F*A*Pts

Club Sando*3*2*0*1*4*0*7

Violette AC*2*2*0*0*4*0*6

Defence Force*3*1*0*2*2*6*3

Delfines Del Este*3*0*2*1*0*1*2

SV Broki*3*0*1*2*2*4*1

Group B

Salcedo*3*1*2*0*3*2*5

Cibao*2*1*1*0*2*1*4

Portmore Utd*2*1*0*1*3*2*3

Cavalier*3*0*2*1*0*2*2

Mount Pleasant*2*0*1*1*2*3*1