In­ter­im na­tion­al se­nior women’s team coach Ken­wyne Jones and his team will be hop­ing to end a four-match win­less run when T&T comes up against host Do­mini­can Re­pub­lic in the first of two friend­ly in­ter­na­tion­als in San Cristo­bal, Do­mini­can Re­pub­lic on Fri­day evening.

The clash be­tween the Karyn Fobes-cap­tained T&T women and the Do­mini­can Re­pub­lic kicks off at the Pan Amer­i­can Sta­di­um from 5 pm with the sec­ond match card­ed for the same venue on Tues­day with the same kick-off time.

Last month, Jones, the for­mer na­tion­al men’s se­nior team cap­tain and World Cup play­er, was in­stalled as the in­ter­im boss and guid­ed his team two drawn re­sults against Pana­ma at the Ato Boldon Sta­di­um, Cou­va, first 0-0 and then 1-1 to kick off prepa­ra­tions for the Con­ca­caf Women’s World Cup qual­i­fiers to­wards Aus­tralia and New Zealand 2023.

In the qual­i­fiers, T&T will face Guyana, Nicaragua, Do­mini­ca, and Turks and Caicos Is­lands in Group F be­gin­ning in Feb­ru­ary.

The T&T women are cur­rent­ly on a four-match win­less run dat­ing back to their 5-0 de­feat of An­tigua and Bar­bu­da on Oc­to­ber 2, 2019.

Since then the T&T women suf­fered a shock 4-1 loss to St Kitts & Nevis on Oc­to­ber 6, 2019, fol­lowed by a goal­less draw against the Do­mini­can Re­pub­lic in Oc­to­ber 2019 and last month’s two drawn match­es against Pana­ma.

And the last time, T&T women record­ed a win over the Do­mini­can Re­pub­lic was back in 2006 dur­ing their women’s World Cup qual­i­fy­ing cam­paign, a 7-0 road win.

Since then, Do­mini­can Re­pub­lic has man­aged to beat T&T 1-0 in 2011 dur­ing the Olympic Games qual­i­fiers and fol­lowed it up with a goal­less draw in their last meet­ing in 2019 at the Ato Boldon Sta­di­um.

Ear­li­er this year, Do­mini­can Re­pub­lic al­so start­ed their women’s World Cup prepa­ra­tions, los­ing 5-0 to Pana­ma in Ju­ly be­fore beat­ing Bo­livia 3-0 on Oc­to­ber 22 and then bat­tling to a 1-1 draw in their sec­ond match, three days lat­er.

And faced with the next two match­es to end off the year on a high, both teams will be keen to leave their mark.

Speak­ing at a me­dia con­fer­ence held by the Do­mini­can Re­pub­lic Foot­ball Fed­er­a­tion High-Per­for­mance Cen­tre via Zoom, Jones, a for­mer Eng­land and USA-based pro­fes­sion­al said his team was keen­ly look­ing for­ward to the match­es.

The for­mer na­tion­al strik­er said, “We are very ex­cit­ed to have these match­es with the Do­mini­can Re­pub­lic and I think it’s a re­al­ly good op­por­tu­ni­ty for both teams to have some prepa­ra­tions be­fore the qual­i­fiers in Feb­ru­ary, and I do en­vi­sion that these two games will be a re­al­ly good test for both of us.

The T&T team ar­rived in San­to Domin­go on Mon­day evening ahead of the match­es and since then Jones said the group has set­tled in nice­ly with train­ing ses­sions at the Fe­lix Sanchez Olympic Sta­di­um.

He said, “I think our team has been do­ing very well since we came here on Mon­day night and our train­ing ses­sions every day have been re­al­ly good and the play­ers are ready to play.

“They are hap­py to be here and al­so to play against the Do­mini­can Re­pub­lic as I think they are the per­fect op­po­si­tion for us at this point be­cause our first game in the group qual­i­fiers is Nicaragua and we see a lot of sim­i­lar­i­ties with the two teams, and we are hop­ing that it helps us to find so­lu­tions and pre­pare well for when we get to that game.”

With some of his play­ers com­ing from North Amer­i­ca and Eu­rope to link up with the team on Mon­day, Jones said the first ses­sion on Tues­day was, as ex­pect­ed, a lit­tle bit off the pace.

“They (play­ers) had to re­cov­er from some jet lag and dif­fer­ence in trav­el time but since then the play­ers have all set­tled down nice­ly and are work­ing and cop­ing pret­ty well and with one more ses­sion at the match venue on Thurs­day evening, I en­vi­sion the team be­ing well pre­pared for Fri­day’s first match against the host."

A mem­ber of the se­nior women’s team since 2010, To­ba­go-born team cap­tain, Forbes was al­so ex­cit­ed­ly look­ing ahead to the match­es.

The hard-tack­ling Forbes, one of sev­en vet­er­ans in the team added, “I’m hap­py to be here as cap­tain and I think this is a very good op­por­tu­ni­ty not on­ly for my­self but for my team and this is an­oth­er test for us in try­ing to qual­i­fy for the World Cup and we are very ex­cit­ed about these two games.”

The host be­gan their prepa­ra­tions on Tues­day with the 22 play­ers who were sum­moned by Span­ish coach, José Ben­i­to Ru­bido and his coach­ing staff.

T&T se­nior women 22 mem­ber squad:

Ten­isha Palmer, Naomie Guer­ra, Den­necia Prince, Kimi­ka Forbes, Ken­nya Cord­ner, Col­lette Mor­gan, Karyn Forbes, Tsianne Le­an­der, Rhea Bel­grave, Jaasiel Forde, Maylee At­tin-John­son, Chel­cy Ralph, Aky­la Wal­cott, Rae­nah Camp­bell, Liana Hinds, Kedie John­son, Asha James, Kay­deen Jack, Chel­si Jadoo, Vic­to­ria Swift, Lau­ryn Hutchin­son, Chris­sy Mitchell,

Tech­ni­cal staff: Ken­wyne Jones (coach), Char­lie Mitchell

(as­sis­tant coach), James Baird (goal­keep­er coach), At­i­ba Downes (strength and con­di­tion­ing train­er), DR Anyl Goopeesingh (doc­tor), Aqiy­la Gomez (phys­io­ther­a­pist), Ter­ry John­son-Je­re­mi­ah (equip­ment man­ag­er), Alexan­dria Olton (Sports psy­chol­o­gist), Kyl­la Charles (med­ical mas­sage), Joanne Daniel (man­ag­er)

Do­mini­can Re­pub­lic:

Goal­keep­ers: Clau­dia Tor­res (Bob Soc­cer School), Odaliana Gómez (Match­fit FC - USA);

Dfend­ers: Pao­la Then (San­ta Fe FC), Bri­anne Reed (FC Nord­s­jael­land - Den­mark), María López (FC Ro­dríguez Gar­cía), Gabriel­la Marte (Hof­s­tra - USA), Lynette Ure­ña (Delaware State Uni­ver­si­ty - USA), Gio­van­na Dion­i­cio (Yale Uni­ver­si­ty - USA), Gabirella Cuevas (KuPS - Fin­land) and Keis­la Gil (April 5).

Mid­field­ers: Manuela Lareo (RCD Es­pany­ol - Spain), Lucía Marte (Re­al Betis - Spain), Ja­z­lyn Oviedo (Mon­mouth Uni­ver­si­ty - USA), Winib­ian Per­al­ta (Bob Soc­cer School), Re­na­ta Mer­cedes (Taft School - USA), Kathrynn González (Mar­shall Uni­ver­si­ty - USA);

For­wards: Vanes­sa Kara (Rac­ing Louisville - USA), Daphne Heyaime (DV7 Acad­e­my), Alyssa Oviedo (Uni­ver­si­ty of Ver­mont), Ja­z­lyn Moya (A4Sports), Yoneldy Peña (A4Sports).