U17 Female Football National Team Loses to Curacao

Similarly, the under-seventeen female football national team is in Florida competing in the 2021 Women’s Under 17 Championship. During the match against Curacao held today, the national team lost in a three-to-one final score. News Five got an interview with Head Coach for the team, Iris Centeno, who broke down what happened and the mindset of the team going forward.

Iris Centeno

Iris Centeno, Head Coach, U-17 Female Football National Team

“Unfortunately the outcome wasn’t what we were expecting. Nonetheless, we have already evaluated what transpired, the mistakes, where we fall short and we are going back to the drawing board to work on our other game. We have another game on Friday and we are already working on what we will do for that game to avoid these mistakes and fix it. Today we can say that the exposure was one of the biggest issues that we had. Belize already plays better football when it comes to female, but unfortunately, we haven’t given the players the exposure to shake off the nerves and so forth. Unfortunately, due to the pandemic, we were not able to execute it, to take girls out there before the tournament to have real games. We had games home against other national teams at our level, but it is not the same thing. We need the exposure so that the girls get used to these types of emotions; how to deal with the emotions when it comes to the tournament itself. If you were watching the game, in the first half we started very shaky. But for all of those who stick with us and watch the entire game and watch the second half, we kept the pressure on the opponent. The ball was most of the time in the opponent half, but unfortunately, we couldn’t finish. So you can see that it was just nerves and being nervous, anxious in the beginning, but after, the girls started to play more relax and play their game.”