By Stephan Sookram

THE pride and joy of Guyanese football goes on show this evening in Puerto Rico when the Golden Jaguars face that country’s national team in the Caribbean Football Union Scotiabank 2016 Men’s Caribbean Cup first round.

The Golden Jaguars, fresh off their 7-0 win against Anguilla last Tuesday in Guyana, will have a different brand of football to adapt to when they face the country’s El Huracán Azul (The Blue Hurricane).

The Spanish-speaking team blew away Anguilla 4-0 in their last encounter but the Jags skipper Christopher Nurse believes that the winds of change will blow in favour of the South American side telling Chronicle Sport, “We’re in good stead to get a positive result.”

“As a team we’re pretty sure if we can remain tight and disciplined in defence, our attacking players will get the opportunity to score goals and create opportunities,” continued the Jags skipper.

“I think the team is confident coming off the back of the Anguilla win but we know that Puerto Rico are going to be a different team to face, a much more difficult team than Anguilla and playing away from home, we know that they’ll have a big crowd which will make it a little more difficult for us,” contended Nurse.

Nurse, who signed with that country’s Puerto Rico FC team earlier this month, has already seen an advantage to spending time in the Caribbean country adding, “I have an insight into some of the players that they have on their team because some of them play with me on the club team.”

“We have a little more depth on some of the players in their team which is always good in our preparation, but overall I feel it’s a game where we can get a positive result and top the group. Come next week time we should be top of the group with a better seeding going into the next round.”

He pegged the encounter to be an ‘entertaining affair’ but still gave the Jags the edge over their ‘windy’ opponents. The Jags unit includes seven oversea based players – Neil Danns (England); Samuel Cox (England), Walter Moore (Finland); Brandon Beresford (U.S.A); Christopher Nurse (Puerto Rico), Marcel Barrington (England) and Anthony Whyte (Canada) and Nurse will be looking to their experience once selected by coach Jamaal Shabazz.

Senior members in Gregory ‘Jackie Chan’ Richardson and Vurlon ‘GQ’ Mills are also expected to play integral roles in attacking when the winds lull, while Nurse is expected to shepherd the back four to batten down the hatches for the storm that is to come. Nonetheless, the game gets going at 19:05hrs at the Juan Ramon Loubriel Stadium and when the winds die down 90 minutes later, the winner will assume the lead of group five in the tournament.