A goal each by Asha James and cap­tain Karyn Forbes, T&T se­nior women's team play­ing with a play­er short for 46 min­utes, emerged with a well-fought 2-1 win over Nicaragua on Thurs­day in their 2022 Con­ca­caf World Cham­pi­onship, which serves as a qual­i­fy­ing com­pe­ti­tion for the 2023 FI­FA Women’s World Cup and the Paris 2024 Olympic Games.

On a windy and sun­ny day at the Hase­ly Craw­ford Sta­di­um in Mu­cu­rapo, Port-of-Spain, the "Women War­riors" coach by Ken­wyne Jones and as­sis­tant coach Car­los Ed­wards, both for­mer na­tion­al se­nior play­ers, dom­i­nat­ed pro­ceed­ings in front of a small crowd.

It was T&T who threat­ened ear­ly on thanks to Maria-Frances Ser­rant, who plays for Cor­ban Uni­ver­si­ty in the USA, lead­ing some nice build-ups by the lo­cal team but didn't get a shot at goal.

How­ev­er, the host team was re­ward­ed with its open­ing item from mid­field­er Asha James in the 17th with an as­sist from de­fend­er Lau­ryn Hutchin­son, who drib­bled through the de­fence. She slipped the ball to James, who gave it a soft touch to get the lone de­fend­er and scored past Nicaraguan goal­keep­er Betha­nia Abur­to.

T&T kept push­ing, earn­ing sev­er­al cor­ners and had their sec­ond goal, off a head­er from de­fend­er Rhea Bel­grave in the 28th but she was deemed off-side by the lines­man.

Two min­utes lat­er, Nicaragua's best chance in the first half came just be­fore the first wa­ter break in the 30th when de­fend­er Shey­la Flo­res caught T&T goal-keep­er Kimi­ka Forbes off her line but her long-range shot, thank­ful­ly for the T&T cus­to­di­an, went over the bar.

On the re­turn to the field, the Nicaraguans kept press­ing search­ing for the equalis­er but T&T kept them at bay.

T&T, though, went down a play­er in the 44th when Kedie John­son was booked her sec­ond yel­low card and shown the red card by ref­er­ee Lizzet Gar­cia af­ter the mid­field­er got her hand to the face of Yesse­nia Flo­res. Noth­ing re­sult­ed from the free-kick and the score­line re­mained un­changed at the half.

On the re­sump­tion, Nicaragua up a play­er con­tin­ued to press in search of its open­ing goal but it was T&T earn­ing an­oth­er cor­ner kick, 14 over­all, in the 49th. Liana Hinds put in a good ball but it was cleared to the side­line by a Nicaraguan de­fend­er. The en­su­ing throw-in saw James take a nice long-range shot but it went wide of goal.

Down the oth­er end, Karyn Forbes was called for a hand­ball at the top of the box. Off the set play, ...tried to go through the two-play­er wall but it de­flect­ed wide of the goal off a Nicaraguan play­er

In the 54th minute, keep­er Forbes gave her team a scare when she land­ed bad­ly grab­bing her left an­kle and seemed to be in a lot of pain but re­mained in the match af­ter be­ing treat­ed by the train­ing staff.

T&T's sec­ond goal came in the 64th. A good shot by Cay­la Mc­Far­lane was saved ini­tial­ly by keep­er Abur­ro but Karen Forbes net­ted the re­bound, scor­ing her sev­enth in­ter­na­tion­al goal.

Mc­Far­lene, who did her job was sub­sti­tut­ed by coach Jones and re­placed by Den­necia Prince in the 67th minute.

T&T un­for­tu­nate­ly was down to nine play­ers in the 79th. Bel­grave had to stretchered off af­ter suf­fer­ing cramps ear­ly in the sec­ond half. Her re­place­ment Abisha Guy en­tered in the 85th.

This af­ter coach Jones was faced with an­oth­er is­sue af­ter keep­er Forbes went down again af­ter leap­ing to en­sure a ball was safe­ly over the bar but in turn, seemed to ag­gra­vate her in­jury. She was stretchered off and coach Jones was forced to bring in his last sub­sti­tu­tion, in the form of Tene­sha Palmer to pro­tect the goal in the five min­utes added-on time.

Nicaragua kept the pres­sure on and in the fi­nal sec­ond of added-on time pulled a goal back through Flo­res. The for­ward drib­bled through three play­ers made a move on her left and then scooped the ball off her right-foot past sub­sti­tute keep­er Palmer, to re­duce the vis­i­tors' deficit with less than a minute to play.

T&T will take on Do­mini­ca in Guyana in three days time, and then play Turks and Caicos Is­lands on April 9, and Guyana on April 12 to close out the round-robin pool cam­paign. At the end of this stage, on­ly the top team will qual­i­fy for the next phase of the com­pe­ti­tion.

RE­SULT

T&T 2 (Asha James 17th, Karyn Forbes 64th) vs Nicaragua 1 (Yesse­nia Flo­res 90th+5).

TEAMS

T&T start­ing team: Kimi­ka Forbes (No 1), Rhea Bel­grave, Liana Hinds, Vic­to­ria Swift, Amaya El­lis, Asha James, Karyn Forbes, Kedie John­son (No 15), Cay­la Mc Far­lane, Maria-Frances Ser­rant, Lau­ryn Hutchin­son.

Subs used: Den­necia Prince, Shani Nakhid, Abisha Guy, Tene­sha Palmer,

Subs not used: Shau­nalee Govia, Kay­deen Jack, Chel­cy Ralph, Maya Ma­touk, Meyah Romeo, Klil Kheswar.

Coach: Ken­wyne Jones

As­sis­tant coach: Car­los Ed­wards

NICARAGUA start­ing team: Betha­nia Abur­to, Martha Sil­va, Kesly Perez, Ja­clyn Gil­day, Lis­beth Moreno, Yor­cel­ly Humphreys, Sim­ri Vil­larey­na, Shey­la Flo­res, Yesse­nia Flo­res, Dayaana Calero, Lili­eth Rivera.

Subs used: Na­tal­ie Orel­lana, Jan­sy Aguirre, Jos­sel­ing Berrios

Subs not used: An­gela Gui­ter­rez, Heyssel Mar­tinez, Rey­na Her­nan­dez,

Coach: El­na Dixon

As­sis­tant coach: Ty­ron Aceve­do Sel­va.