CONCACAF Under-20 Women's Championship – Cuba...Lady Jags needle Puerto Rico; Cuba, Jamaica advance to finals

CONCACAF Under-20 Women’s Championship – Cuba…Lady Jags needle Puerto Rico; Cuba, Jamaica advance to finals

Jan 13, 2012 Sports

Guyana’s Lady Jags closed out competition in the CONCACAF Under-20 Women’s Championship on

Ashley Savona

Wednesday with a 1-0 win over Puerto Rico at the Estadio Pedro Marrero Ciudad de La Habana, Cuba.
The win for the young Guyana team was their first following defeats to Cuba (1-5) and Trinidad and Tobago (1-2); the Lady Jags scoring first in all their encounters.
Going into the game, Puerto Rico was in position to claim the Havana group berth with a victory over Guyana following their win over T&T and a drwan match against Cuba but the Lady Jags had other ideas.
Leading the Jags to their win was star forward Ashlee Savona who rocked the nets in the 27th minute for her third goal in as many matches and her 7th in six matches; Puerto Rico fought for all their worth but never was able to equalize earning Guyana a well deserved win.
Meanwhile, Rachel Peleaz scored for a third straight game and earned Cuba a 1-1 draw with Trinidad & Tobago, sending the Cubans and Jamaica to the CONCACAF Under-20 Women’s Championship finals.
Peleaz’s 48th-minute goal equalized after a 20th-minute opener from Janelle McGee gave Trinidad the lead, McGee’s third goal in five games of qualifying.
Peleaz had a goal in Cuba’s 1-1 draw with Puerto Rico on Monday and a pair in Saturday’s 5-1 win over Guyana. She had six goals in five games overall in qualifying.
The result finished Cuba atop its final-round qualifying group with five points, one better than Trinidad and Puerto Rico, which fell to Guyana 1-0 giving Jamaica the final berth in the eight-team CONCACAF finals field.
Jamaica finished second behind Haiti with six points in the other final-round Caribbean qualifying group. Haiti clinched its berth on Tuesday with a 3-0 victory over the Cayman Islands.
It will be the sixth straight appearance in the U-20 women’s finals for Jamaica, which finished as high as fourth in 2006, and third straight for Cuba. Haiti, Cuba and Jamaica will join host Panama, Guatemala and automatic North American qualifiers Canada, Mexico and the United States for the finals, March 1-11 in Panama City.