KEI­TH JEF­FREY, head­coach of San Juan Jabloteh, is ques­tion­ing the omis­sion of his strik­er Nathan Lewis from a most­ly lo­cal­ly-based So­ca War­riors squad for a March 19 friend­ly in­ter­na­tion­al away to Grena­da as T&T re­sumes its Con­ca­caf Semi­fi­nal Round 2018 World Cup prepa­ra­tions.

The match ver­sus Grena­da is the lone warm-up for T&T which will next face St Vin­cent & The Grenadines on March 25 in St Vin­cent and then March 29 at the Hase­ly Craw­ford Sta­di­um, Mu­cu­rapo in their next two match­es be­fore meet­ing Guatemala and USA in their re­main­ing match­es.

Lewis, in his first sea­son with the club af­ter mov­ing from Mor­vant Cale­do­nia Unit­ed has quick­ly grown in­to a San Juan Jabloteh home favourite af­ter just two games at the Barataria Recre­ation Ground. Now with ten goals on the sea­son and six in his last four match­es, the 25-year-old Lewis came in for some prais­es from his Jef­frey af­ter the win.

"Out of the 22 play­ers on the field he (Lewis) was a to­tal stand­out tonight (Sat­ur­day), and his s pace and move­ment de­stroyed Army," stat­ed Jef­frey

The Jabloteh coach said he was dis­ap­point­ed that Lewis was not se­lect­ed among a 22-man squad, main­ly made up of lo­cal­ly based play­ers, by So­ca War­riors coach Stephen Hart for an up­com­ing friend­ly in­ter­na­tion­al against Grena­da on March 19. "I am so dis­ap­point­ed and can't un­der­stand you're pick­ing a lo­cal na­tion­al team and no Nathan Lewis. He has been ex­cel­lent all sea­son, not just tonight. (Jer­wyn) Balt­haz­ar was among the 22 play­ers on the field tonight and was ab­sent be­cause of the speed of the game. Balt­haz­ar at age 33 was se­lect­ed on the na­tion­al team. I don't un­der­stand it, leave Balt­haz­ar on the na­tion­al Fut­sal team!" stat­ed an up­set Jef­frey.

The Jabloteh coach al­so called on Hart to have more faith in lo­cal play­ers and that more top na­tion­al team op­po­nents must be pro­vid­ed to help lo­cal play­ers im­prove for the in­ter­na­tion­al stage.

"We are not giv­ing the lo­cal guys the reg­u­lar in­ter­na­tion­al ex­po­sure," said the Jabloteh coach. "We have to get the right op­po­nents on a reg­u­lar ba­sis to help de­vel­op our play­ers for the in­ter­na­tion­al stage, we have no ex­cuse.

He al­so point­ed out that Ja­maica na­tion­al team man­ages to at­tract qual­i­ty op­po­nents on a reg­u­lar ba­sis to keep their play­ers in good com­pet­i­tive sharpe on a reg­u­lar ba­sis and ask T&T is not do­ing the same . "This Pro League is very good and I am proud of this league and great work of the lo­cal coach­es.

For in­stance Club San­do re­cent­ly got four Grena­da na­tion­al team play­ers and those play­ers aren't mas­ter­ing our league. It's time na­tion­al team coach­es re­al­ly start hav­ing faith in the lo­cal play­ers who just need con­sis­tent in­ter­na­tion­al lev­el play."

Jef­frey al­so wel­comes the two-week break to fa­cil­i­tate T&T's prepa­ra­tion for the Grena­da friend­ly and World Cup qual­i­fiers against St. Vin­cent and the Grenadines be­fore the Pro League re­sumes on the week­end of April 1-3.