The BVI Men’s National team is now unbeaten in two straight Concacaf Nations League games after being held to a 1-1 draw by Dominica, in St Lucia on Thursday 12th October.
The youthful BVI team again have sent a message out across the Caribbean that they are quickly becoming a force to be reckoned with and are stringing together results against more illustrious and certainly higher ranked opponents under the leadership of Coach Chris Kiwomya
“We are definitely punching above our weight now and rightly so!” beamed Kiwomya after the game “the result sets us up nicely for the trip to Turks and Caicos”.
Kiwomya also stated that he was really proud of his team after battling away for 90 mins and being unlucky not to have grabbed all three points “it was a difficult game against a really good team, but you wouldn’t have thought there was much between the side after watching our performance. They gave everything tonight, fought so hard and if we can now go to the TCI and get a positive result we can face Dominica again at our place, and with the crowd behind us as our 12th man, then we can get out of this group”.
The BVI took the lead against their more illustrious and higher ranked opponents in the 28th minute through Luka Chalwell who showed a sublime first touch and control off his chest from a long pass to calmly beat the Dominica goalkeeper, Glenson Prince.
Tyler Forbes and Chalwell continued their exciting link up play from the previous game against TCI on the A.O. Shirley Ground back in September and created numerous opportunities to double the advantage, with one such guilt edged chance seeing Forbes play Chalwell through on goal, but just unable to wrap his foot around the ball to find the target.
At the other end Daniel Gillford made a couple of crucial saves to keep the BVI ahead, firstly atoning for his own poor clearance to deny Dominica an equalizer with a point blank save and then secondly denying Dominica, saving a header from close range.
In the second half Forbes missed a chance one on one with the keeper and with Dominica getting more and more desperate, the BVI were punished for being less than clinical in front of goal, when Dominica equalised in the 83rd minute as Briel Thomas headed the ball in from a free kick, under pressure from Gilford who just failed to make contact with a punched clearance attempt.
There was still time for the game to get ugly with Dominica players showing displeasure at a late dangerous tackle from Carlos Septus, for which he was given his marching orders on Felix Anselm and the BVIFA send their best wishes to the player for a speedy recovery.
The game against TCI is scheduled for Monday 16th October in the TCI with a 4pm kick off.