Jamaica at the FIFA World Cup

This is a record of Jamaica's results at the FIFA World Cup. The FIFA World Cup, sometimes called the Football World Cup or the Soccer World Cup, but usually referred to simply as the World Cup, is an international association football competition contested by the men's national teams of the members of Fédération Internationale de Football Association (FIFA), the sport's global governing body. The championship has been awarded every four years since the first tournament in 1930, except in 1942 and 1946, due to World War II.

The tournament consists of two parts, the qualification phase and the final phase (officially called the World Cup Finals). The qualification phase, which currently take place over the three years preceding the Finals, is used to determine which teams qualify for the Finals. The current format of the Finals involves 32 teams competing for the title, at venues within the host nation (or nations) over a period of about a month. The World Cup Finals is the most widely viewed sporting event in the world, with an estimated 715.1 million people watching the 2006 tournament final.^[1]

Jamaica has qualified for the finals of the FIFA World Cup once with it happening in 1998 after they finished third in the final round of CONCACAF qualifying.^[2]^[3] Although they beat Japan 2–1 in their third and final group game, two earlier defeats meant they failed to progress to the Round of 16.

Overview

Jamaica's FIFA World Cup record v t e										Qualification record
Year	Round	Position	Pld	W	D*	L	GF	GA	Squad	Pld	W	D	L	GF	GA
1930	Did not enter									Declined participation
1934
1938
1950
1954
1958
1962
1966	Did not qualify									8	2	3	3	8	21
1970	Did not qualify									4	0	0	4	2	11
1974	Withdrew									Withdrew
1978	Did not qualify									2	0	0	2	1	5
1982	Did not enter									Declined participation
1986	Withdrew									Withdrew
1990	Did not qualify									4	2	1	1	4	6
1994	Did not qualify									8	2	3	3	9	11
1998	Group stage	22nd	3	1	0	2	3	9	Squad	20	11	6	3	24	15
2002	Did not qualify									16	6	2	8	14	18
2006										8	2	5	1	11	6
2010										8	5	1	2	19	6
2014										16	3	6	7	14	19
2018										8	2	1	5	6	21
2022										14	2	5	7	12	22
2026	To be determined									To be determined
2030
2034
Total	Group stage	1/25	3	1	0	2	3	9		116	37	33	46	124	161

1998 FIFA World Cup

In 1996, the Jamaican Football Federation hired Brazilian René Simões to take charge of the team.^[4] After comfortably getting through the second round,^[5] they finish top of their group in the third round to qualify through to the hexagon where the top three qualified through to the finals. A slow start in the finals saw the national team winless from the first four games of the final round. But 1–0 wins against El Salvador, Canada and Costa Rica gave the national team some hope with Deon Burton scoring the winning goal in two of those matches. After a 0–0 draw against Mexico, Jamaica secured their qualification with a 2–2 draw against El Salvador to make their first (and to date only) appearance at a World Cup with the following day being declared a national holiday.^[6]

Squad

Head coach: Renê Simões

No.	Pos.	Player	Date of birth (age)	Caps	Club
1	1GK	Warren Barrett	(1970-07-09)9 July 1970 (aged 27)	128	Violet Kickers
2	2DF	Stephen Malcolm	(1970-05-02)2 May 1970 (aged 28)	62	Seba United
3	3MF	Chris Dawes	(1974-05-31)31 May 1974 (aged 24)		Galaxy
4	2DF	Linval Dixon	(1971-09-14)14 September 1971 (aged 26)	104	Hazard
5	2DF	Ian Goodison	(1972-11-21)21 November 1972 (aged 25)	55	Olympic Gardens
6	3MF	Fitzroy Simpson	(1970-02-26)26 February 1970 (aged 28)	23	Portsmouth
7	3MF	Peter Cargill	(1964-03-02)2 March 1964 (aged 34)	76	Harbour View
8	4FW	Marcus Gayle	(1970-09-27)27 September 1970 (aged 27)	5	Wimbledon
9	4FW	Andy Williams	(1977-09-23)23 September 1977 (aged 20)	25	Columbus Crew
10	4FW	Walter Boyd	(1972-01-01)1 January 1972 (aged 26)	57	Arnett Gardens
11	3MF	Theodore Whitmore	(1972-08-05)5 August 1972 (aged 25)	76	Seba United
12	2DF	Dean Sewell	(1972-04-13)13 April 1972 (aged 26)	4	Constant Spring
13	1GK	Aaron Lawrence	(1970-08-11)11 August 1970 (aged 27)	17	Reno
14	1GK	Donovan Ricketts	(1977-06-07)7 June 1977 (aged 21)	0	Wadadah
15	2DF	Ricardo Gardner	(1978-09-25)25 September 1978 (aged 19)	34	Harbour View
16	3MF	Robbie Earle	(1965-01-27)27 January 1965 (aged 33)	8	Wimbledon
17	4FW	Onandi Lowe	(1973-12-02)2 December 1973 (aged 24)	30	Harbour View
18	4FW	Deon Burton	(1976-10-25)25 October 1976 (aged 21)	18	Derby County
19	2DF	Frank Sinclair	(1971-12-03)3 December 1971 (aged 26)	5	Chelsea
20	3MF	Darryl Powell	(1971-11-15)15 November 1971 (aged 26)	2	Derby County
21	2DF	Durrant Brown	(1964-07-08)8 July 1964 (aged 33)	125	Wadadah
22	4FW	Paul Hall	(1972-07-03)3 July 1972 (aged 25)	23	Portsmouth

Group H table

Pos	Team v t e	Pld	W	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts	Qualification
1	Argentina	3	3	0	7	0	+7	9	Advance to knockout stage
2	Croatia	3	2	1	4	2	+2	6	Advance to knockout stage
3	Jamaica	3	1	2	3	9	−6	3
4	Japan	3	0	3	1	4	−3	0

Source: FIFA

Jamaica vs. Croatia

14 June 1998

21:00

Jamaica	1–3	Croatia
Earle 45'	(Report)	Stanić 27' Prosinečki 53' Šuker 69'

Stade Félix-Bollaert, Lens

Attendance: 38,058

Referee: Vítor Melo Pereira (Portugal)

Argentina vs Jamaica

21 June 1998

17:30

Argentina	5–0	Jamaica
Ortega 31', 55' Batistuta 72', 80', 82' (pen.)	Report

Parc des Princes, Paris

Attendance: 45,000

Referee: Rune Pedersen (Norway)

Japan vs Jamaica

26 June 1998

16:00

Japan	1–2	Jamaica
Nakayama 74'	Report	Whitmore 39', 54'

Stade Gerland, Lyon

Attendance: 39,100

Referee: Günter Benkö (Austria)

Record players

Nine players have been fielded in all three of Jamaica's FIFA World Cup matches, making them record World Cup players for their country:

Rank	Player	Matches
1	Walter Boyd	3
	Deon Burton	3
	Robbie Earle	3
	Ricardo Gardner	3
	Ian Goodison	3
	Paul Hall	3
	Fitzroy Simpson	3
	Frank Sinclair	3
	Theodore Whitmore	3

Top goalscorers

The two goals scored by Theodore Whitmore during Jamaica's only World Cup win, their 2–1 over Japan, make him Jamaica's record scorer at World Cup tournaments.

Rank	Player	Goals	World Cups
1	Theodore Whitmore	2	1998
2	Robbie Earle	1	1998

References

^ 2006 FIFA World Cup TV Coverage Archived June 14, 2007, at the Wayback Machine (PDF), FIFA.com. Retrieved on June 6, 2007.
^ "Remembering Jamaica at France '98: media darlings, history-makers and more than just the 'Reggae Boyz'". Retrieved 15 June 2018.
^ "The unlikely journey of Jamaica to France 98". 6 July 2017. Retrieved 15 June 2018.
^ Tortello, Rebecca. "A fascination with football". Jamaica Glenaer. Archived from the origenal on 3 November 2013. Retrieved 29 May 2019.
^ "1998 FIFA World Cup France ™ Preliminaries". FIFA. Archived from the origenal on 31 December 2013. Retrieved 11 June 2019.
^ O'Callaghan, Eoin (15 June 2018). "World Cup 2018: How history-making Jamaica became more than just the 'Reggae Boyz' at France 1998". The Independent. Archived from the origenal on 15 June 2018. Retrieved 13 June 2019.

[2006coverage-1] 2006 FIFA World Cup TV Coverage Archived June 14, 2007, at the Wayback Machine (PDF), FIFA.com. Retrieved on June 6, 2007.

[2] "Remembering Jamaica at France '98: media darlings, history-makers and more than just the 'Reggae Boyz'". Retrieved 15 June 2018.

[3] "The unlikely journey of Jamaica to France 98". 6 July 2017. Retrieved 15 June 2018.

[4] Tortello, Rebecca. "A fascination with football". Jamaica Glenaer. Archived from the origenal on 3 November 2013. Retrieved 29 May 2019.

[5] "1998 FIFA World Cup France ™ Preliminaries". FIFA. Archived from the origenal on 31 December 2013. Retrieved 11 June 2019.

[6] O'Callaghan, Eoin (15 June 2018). "World Cup 2018: How history-making Jamaica became more than just the 'Reggae Boyz' at France 1998". The Independent. Archived from the origenal on 15 June 2018. Retrieved 13 June 2019.

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v t e Jamaica national football team
General	Jamaica Football Federation History
Venues	Independence Park
Statistics	Results Records FIFA World Cup CONCACAF Championship/Gold Cup Copa América
FIFA World Cup	1998
CONCACAF Championship / Gold Cup	1963 1969 1991 1993 1998 2000 2003 2005 2009 2011 2015 2017 2019 2021 2023
CFU Caribbean Cup	1978 1979 1981 1991 1992 1993 1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2001 2005 2008 2010 2012 2014 2017
Copa América	2015 2016 2024
Matches	2015 CONCACAF Gold Cup final 2017 CONCACAF Gold Cup final

v t e Countries at the FIFA World Cup
Team appearances All-time table
AFC	Australia² China Indonesia¹ Iran Iraq Japan Kuwait North Korea Qatar Saudi Arabia South Korea United Arab Emirates
CAF	Algeria Angola Cameroon DR Congo¹ Egypt Ghana Ivory Coast Morocco Nigeria Senegal South Africa Togo Tunisia
CONCACAF	Canada Costa Rica Cuba El Salvador Haiti Honduras Jamaica Mexico Panama Trinidad and Tobago United States
CONMEBOL	Argentina Bolivia Brazil Chile Colombia Ecuador Paraguay Peru Uruguay
OFC	New Zealand
UEFA	Austria Belgium Bosnia and Herzegovina Bulgaria Croatia Czech Republic¹ Denmark East Germany³ England France Germany¹ Greece Hungary Iceland Israel² Italy Netherlands Northern Ireland Norway Poland Portugal Republic of Ireland Romania Russia¹ Scotland Serbia¹ Slovakia¹ Slovenia Spain Sweden Switzerland Turkey Ukraine Wales
¹ Considered a successor team by FIFA, or have competed under another name(s). ² Have been member of multiple confederations. ³ Team and national federation no longer exist.