Nigel Si­mon

So­ca Princess­es coach, Nor­we­gian-born Even Pellerud says his team will be ready for the big task of beat­ing Ko­rea DPR, in a must-win Group A fi­nal round match in the Fi­fa Un­der-17 Women's World Cup match from 6pm to­day. The clash be­tween the So­ca Princess­es and de­fend­ing Un­der-17 cham­pi­ons, Ko­rea DPR takes place at Ato Boldon Sta­di­um, Cou­va. This will be pre­ced­ed by a 3pm Group B meet­ing be­tween, Mex­i­co and South Africa, who have al­ready been elim­i­nat­ed. Cur­rent­ly, Nige­ria leads Group A with max­i­mum six points from two match­es af­ter wins over Ko­rea DPR (3-2) and T&T (2-1) and has al­ready booked a quar­ter­fi­nal spot. Ko­rea DPR and T&T have three points each while Chile is bot­tom of the group with­out a point. How­ev­er, Ko­rea DPR is ahead of T&T on goal-dif­fer­ence and need on­ly a draw to reach the quar­ter­fi­nals at the ex­pense of the So­ca Princess­es, who must win.

Speak­ing at the pre-match press con­fer­ence held at the Hy­att Re­gency Ho­tel, Wright­son Road, yes­ter­day, Pellerud said his team has done well so far but their goal is to get to the next round. "We were good in our first match against Chile and much bet­ter against a stronger Nige­ria team. But we have a goal of reach­ing the sec­ond round of the com­pe­ti­tion. "It will be a tough test against Ko­rea DPR who are the de­fend­ing cham­pi­ons, but our goal has al­ways been to qual­i­fy for the next phase of the com­pe­ti­tion and we have pre­pared well for it and will be go­ing all out to get the re­sult we need." With re­gards to team tac­tics, Pellerud said,"We have not de­cid­ed on what for­ma­tion we will be us­ing. The team has func­tioned well so far and I don't think that we will be mak­ing any whole­sale changes. "There is on­ly some con­cern with Jonelle War­rick who is sick and we are not sure if she will re­cov­er in time while an­oth­er play­er has a slight in­jury and we are hop­ing that over the next 24 hours she re­cov­ers.

Whether or not T&T makes it to the next phase of the com­pe­ti­tion, Pellerud said the fu­ture of the game lo­cal­ly for women was bright.

"In the match against Nige­ria six of the girls who start­ed were born in 1995 which means they will be able to play at an­oth­er Un­der-17 World Cup and this is very good for the fu­ture of the women's game.

Pellerud al­so urged the crowd to con­tin­ue to sup­port the na­tion­al team who will be wear­ing a change strip of white jer­seys to­day.

"The sup­port we have been re­ceiv­ing from the coun­try has been re­al­ly great and we are urg­ing the crowd to con­tin­ue," said Pellerud.

Na­tion­al de­fend­er Kha­didra Debe­sette was very con­fi­dent about her team chances and pre­dict­ed a win. "We are just go­ing out there to win and cre­ate more his­to­ry as a team by reach­ing the quar­ter­fi­nals. "We al­ready know what we achieved but that it is all be­hind us now and our fo­cus is on get­ting a win over Ko­rea DPR which we are con­fi­dent of do­ing.

Boost­ed by his team's 3-0 thrash­ing of Chile, Ko­rea DPR coach Ri Song Gun sound­ed more with the match of­fi­cials than his op­po­nents. "As de­fend­ing cham­pi­ons we ex­pect very match to be tough so the im­por­tance of the match is no added pres­sure to us. "The match will have the same sig­nif­i­cance for both teams. We both have to at­tack and de­fend well. "It's a de­ci­sive match but we are not feel­ing any added pres­sure. Our main hope is that the of­fi­cials have a good game and then we will be able to have a good per­for­mance on the pitch," added Song Gun. At the Lar­ry Gomes Sta­di­um, Mal­abar al­so from 6pm, Nige­ria will tack­le Chile in the oth­er Group A match will the on­ly is­sue to be de­cid­ed is whether the West African na­tion make sure of top spot. De­ter­mined to bow put on a high note, the South Amer­i­cans will nev­er­the­less have to make do with­out de­fen­sive cor­ner­stone Nicole Corne­jo, who is sus­pend­ed af­ter be­ing red card­ed in the pre­vi­ous match.

Ger­many, Ko­rea Re­pub­lic bat­tle for top spot

Asian cham­pi­ons, Ko­rea Re­pub­lic and high scor­ing Ger­many will meet to de­cide top spot in Group B of the Fi­fa Un­der-17 Women's World Cup at the Lar­ry Gomes Sta­di­um, Mal­abar from 3pm to­day. Both teams are safe­ly through to the quar­ter­fi­nals with max­i­mum six points each. How­ev­er, the Ger­mans head the ta­ble due to their su­pe­ri­or goal-dif­fer­ence of plus-18 to Ko­rea's plus-five and with big­ger chal­lenges ly­ing ahead, both coach­es are ex­pect­ed to give their re­serve play­ers a run-out. In the oth­er match in the group, al­so-rans South Africa and Mex­i­co, still point­less af­ter a brace of heavy de­feats, will be hop­ing to de­part the tour­na­ment with at least a win.

To­day's match­es

Group A: Chile vs Nige­ria, Lar­ry Gomes Sta­di­um, Mal­abar, 6 pm.

T&T vs Ko­rea DPR, Ato Boldon Sta­di­um, Cou­va, 6 pm.

Group B: Ko­rea Rep vs Ger­many, Lar­ry Gomes Sta­di­um, Mal­abar, 3 pm.

Mex­i­co vs South Africa, Ato Boldon Sta­di­um, Cou­va, 3 pm.

Stand­ings

Group A:

Teams P W D L F A Pts

Nige­ria 2 2 0 0 5 3 6

Ko­rea DPR 2 1 0 1 5 3 3

T&T 2 1 0 1 3 3 3

Chile 2 0 0 2 1 5 0

Group B:

Ger­many 2 2 0 0 19 1 6

Ko­rea Rep 2 2 0 0 7 2 6

South Africa 2 0 0 2 2 13 0

Mex­i­co 2 0 0 2 1 13 0