Na­tion­al se­nior women’s foot­ball coach Ken­wyne Jones is pleased with his team be­ing drawn to play along­side the Con­ca­caf re­gion’s sec­ond-ranked team Cana­da, fourth-ranked Cos­ta Ri­ca and sixth-ranked Pana­ma for the up­com­ing Con­ca­caf W Cham­pi­onships.

The tour­na­ment is sched­uled to be played in Mon­ter­rey, Mex­i­co, be­tween Ju­ly 4-18 and serves as the qual­i­fi­ca­tion tour­na­ment to the 2023 FI­FA Women’s World Cup (FWWC) and, as part of an ex­cit­ing new for­mat, the cham­pi­on will qual­i­fy di­rect­ly to the 2024 Paris Olympic Games.

“We were pleased with the fel­low par­tic­i­pants in our group,” said Jones, yes­ter­day. “We know that step­ping up to this lev­el of qual­i­fi­ca­tion, this Con­ca­caf lev­el, all op­po­nents they are go­ing to be tough match­es but you kind of have bi­as­es of who you would rather face and I think in the end we did prob­a­bly get a favourable draw but at the same time we are go­ing to buck­le down and pre­pare for each match of that group stage.”

The “Women War­riors” booked their spot in the Con­ca­caf W Cham­pi­onships af­ter a 2-2 draw with Guyana at the Dwight Yorke Sta­di­um in Ba­co­let, To­ba­go which saw them play un­beat­en to seal top spot in Group F and qual­i­fy for the fi­nal round.

The for­mer T&T strik­er plans to con­tin­ue look­ing at play­ers over the com­ing months as he pre­pares to fi­nalise the squad for the tough out­ings in Ju­ly.

Jones said: “We are go­ing to have a few oth­er play­ers who were part of the pool that we’re go­ing to see over the next two months or so be­fore the tour­na­ment and hope­ful­ly that would fur­ther add to the lev­el of the squad and the com­pet­i­tive­ness and then give us a good headache go­ing in­to the tour­na­ment.”

In Tues­day night’s draw, the num­ber five ranked Ja­maica and Haiti, rat­ed sev­enth, were drawn in Group A with the US and hosts Mex­i­co, who are ranked third.

The eight teams will com­pete in the Con­ca­caf Women’s Cham­pi­onship which qual­i­fies Con­ca­caf re­gion teams for the Women’s World Cup which will be held from Ju­ly 20 to Au­gust 20 next year in Aus­tralia and New Zealand.

The com­pe­ti­tion will kick off with round-robin group stage play, af­ter which the top two teams in each group will move on to the se­mi-fi­nals and, in do­ing so, qual­i­fy di­rect­ly to the World Cup.

The third-placed teams in each group will qual­i­fy for a 2023 FWWC In­ter­con­ti­nen­tal Play­off.

The se­mi-fi­nals, fi­nal and third-place match will be played in a sin­gle-elim­i­na­tion for­mat, with the cham­pi­on qual­i­fy­ing for both the 2024 Paris Olympics and the in­au­gur­al Con­ca­caf Women’s Gold Cup, to be held in 2024. The run­ner-up and third-place teams will al­so square off in a Con­ca­caf Olympic play-in se­ries, sched­uled for Sep­tem­ber 2023. The win­ner of that play-in se­ries will al­so qual­i­fy for the Paris Olympics and the 2024 Gold Cup.

Haiti will take on USA and Ja­maica will go up against Mex­i­co on the open­ing day of play, ac­cord­ing to the sched­ule un­veiled by Con­ca­caf on Wednes­day.

Group­ings of Con­ca­caf W Cham­pi­onships

Group A: USA, Mex­i­co, Ja­maica, Haiti

Group B: T&T, Cana­da, Cos­ta Ri­ca, Pana­ma

T&T’s match­es

Ju­ly 5: vs Cana­da

Ju­ly 8: vs Cos­ta Ri­ca

Ju­ly 11: vs Pana­ma