Just over one year since their last ap­pear­ance for T&T se­nior men’s foot­ball team, Kevin Moli­no and Jo­evin Jones, both for­mer cap­tains of the So­ca War­riors, are set to re­turn for this coun­try’s fi­nal two match­es in Group B of the CON­CA­CAF Na­tions League against Cu­ba.

The re­call of the duo for the Oc­to­ber 10 and 14 match­es was hint­ed at by T&T in­ter­im coach Derek King when speak­ing to re­porters dur­ing a train­ing ses­sion with a lo­cal group of play­ers at the Hase­ly Craw­ford Sta­di­um, Train­ing Field, Mu­cu­rapo on Thurs­day.

King is set to name his 23-man squad to­day ahead of their de­par­ture for Cu­ba via Mi­a­mi on Sun­day, and dur­ing his in­ter­view he not­ed that the ex­pe­ri­ence of the two play­ers could help with the im­prove­ment of the team.

The So­ca War­riors cur­rent­ly have one point af­ter two match­es in the six-team round-robin group af­ter a 4-0 loss away to Hon­duras and a 0-0 home draw with French Guiana. They will meet Cu­ba in Ha­vana on Thurs­day, Oc­to­ber 10, be­fore host­ing the same op­po­nents at the Dwight Yorke Sta­di­um, Ba­co­let, on Mon­day, Oc­to­ber 14.

Go­ing in­to their fi­nal two match­es, T&T, who reached the semi­fi­nals last time out be­fore falling to the USA on a home-and-away ag­gre­gate 5-3, sits at the at the bot­tom of the stand­ings with the same point tal­ly as French Guiana, while Ja­maica and Nicaragua share the lead with four points each, with Hon­duras next with three and Cu­ba fourth with two points.

Af­ter group stage, the first and sec­ond-place teams of each group will ad­vance to the quar­ter­fi­nals, where they will join the four top-ranked League A teams (Mex­i­co, USA, Pana­ma, and Cana­da). 

With his team fac­ing must-win en­coun­ters in their fi­nal two match­es, King had noth­ing but pos­i­tive words to say about Moli­no and Jones. 

Moli­no, 34, had an­nounced his in­ter­na­tion­al re­tire­ment on Sep­tem­ber 1, 2023, af­ter 59 ap­pear­ances and 29 goals for the So­ca War­riors, cit­ing dif­fer­ences with for­mer coach An­gus Eve, with his last out­ing com­ing against Ja­maica in the 2023 CON­CA­CAF Gold Cup group stage.

He was then re­leased by US Ma­jor League Soc­cer’s Colum­bus Crew on Feb­ru­ary 4, 2024, and has been with­out a club since, while 33-year-old Jones, who has fea­tured 87 times for the na­tion­al se­nior team with 12 goals to his name, al­so had his last run out for T&T at the 2023 Gold Cup but has been in­volved in the T&T Pre­mier Foot­ball League ac­tion for Mis­cel­la­neous Po­lice FC in the CON­CA­CAF Caribbean Cup. 

Com­ment­ing on the pos­si­ble re­turn of the duo, King said, “At the end of the day, every­body is en­ti­tled to stand a chance to make the team. I had a con­ver­sa­tion with Moli­no (Kevin), and we have him here train­ing, and hope­ful­ly we will see how the fi­nal squad goes.” 

A for­mer na­tion­al de­fend­er, King, added, “One thing with him (Moli­no) is that he does work hard, and here is here work­ing hard, and we are play­ing 90-minute games, and so far he is look­ing good.”

Con­cern­ing the de­ci­sion by Moli­no to make him­self avail­able or come out of re­tire­ment, King, in his re­ply, did not con­firm nor de­ny the Care­nage-born for­mer Or­lan­do City mid­field­er’s of­fi­cial re­turn to in­ter­na­tion­al foot­ball.

The in­ter­im coach said, “We didn’t dis­cuss that ei­ther. I picked a lo­cal team to train, and he is in Trinidad and To­ba­go, and with his ex­pe­ri­ence as a guy who has played over 50 games for the coun­try and al­so in the MLS and stuff. So, you know some­times you need ex­pe­ri­ence around the team, and he is here train­ing with us.”

With re­gards to Jones, he stat­ed, “Jo­evin (Jones) is one of the ac­tive lo­cal­ly-based play­ers, and he re­cent­ly played with Po­lice in the CON­CA­CAF Club Cham­pi­onship.

“He was not 100 per­cent, but I think he did well as well, and I spoke with him, and he knows he has to work on his fit­ness, and I think he can bring a lev­el of ex­pe­ri­ence with the younger guys that we have as well.”

Quizzed about Levi Gar­cia of AEK Athens who missed the first two Na­tions League match­es, King said, Levi (Gar­cia) has an in­jury at this point and his club is sup­posed to clear him to play this week­end, and we are still in talks with him to see if he will be avail­able to trav­el with the team to Cu­ba.

Among the play­ers in the pro­vi­sion­al mix are reg­u­lars Du­ane Muck­ette, Ross Rus­sell Jr., Alvin Jones, Kevon Wood­ley, Den­zil Smith, Christo­pher Biggette, Michel Poon-Angeron, and Justin Gar­cia.