SAN SALVADOR, El Salvador — Following their historic silver medal at the Central America and Caribbean (CAC) Games, coach of Jamaica’s Rugby Sevens team (Crocs) Bruce Martin said it will take a collective effort to help the country to qualify for next year’s Olympic Games in Paris.
The Crocs are down to face the likes of host Canada, United States, Mexico, Cayman Islands, Trinidad and Tobago, The Bahamas, and Bermuda in the qualifiers, which will run August 19-20 at Starlight Stadium in Langford, British Columbia.
Martin said that Jamaica have an outstanding chance of qualifying for the Olympics next year because they have shown at the CAC Games that they will become a force to be reckon with, but they need the support and backing behind them.
“The plan now is to move this team forward into Canada to try and qualify for the Olympic Games next year,” said Martin.
“I am very confident in this team, and I have seen progress because half of this team that won the silver medal was under the age of 21 and so it is a good steppingstone for us.
“We have never qualified for the Olympics in Rugby Sevens, and we are chasing that history. However, we just need the continued support of JOA, the Minister of Sports [Olivia Grange] and corporate Jamaica to get behind us because we need all hands-on deck to get these boys over the hump,” Martin said.
The Crocs lost 27-7 in the final at the CAC Games to Colombia. Martin stated the Olympic Games qualifiers are going to be even tougher because they will be going up against some of the best teams in the world, but he thinks his players will be up for the challenge at the tournament.
“This qualifying tournament is going to be very tough because teams like Mexico, Canada and the United States will be in the tournament, but we are no strangers playing these teams,” he said.
“We have an excellent team and so we have a good chance of qualifying for the Olympic Games in Paris,” Martin said.
We have shown that we can compete with the best in the world because they came out here 12 strong and they won silver which they have never done before and this is also an upgrade from the bronze that we won in 2018,” he said.
“We just need Jamaica behind us because rugby is here to stay and this is another sport that can grow tremendously in Jamaica and the Caribbean,” Martin noted.c
