Jamaica 3 Canada 2

Jamaica's Under-17 national team saved their absolute best for last on Friday night at the National Sports Centre, erasing a two-goal deficit before finally walking away with the 2002 International Youth Tournament championship.

Seemingly dead and buried after falling 2-0 behind, courtesy of two quick strikes from Canada's Cam Wilson (34th minute) and Tyler Rosenlund (44th), Jamaica methodically set about a remarkable recovery mission which began with Donovan Miller's brilliant solo effort in the 50th minute and culminated with Andrew Fraser's powerful header at the far post just six minutes from time.

Inbetween, Seon Giveans brought the moderate crowd on hand scrambling to their feet after he cracked home a free kick from all of 30 yards that rifled into the top right hand corner of the Canadian goal, to leave the stunned goalie clutching at thin air.

After referee Stuart Crockwell blew the final whistle, the jubilant Jamaican entourage immediately raced off to the eastern stands to share their delight with the small contingent of Caribbean fans who had vociferously cheered them on throughout the tournament.

"If you understand where Jamaica is coming from in terms of Canada and the United States, we can't go overboard," said Jamaican coach Jackie Walters.

"We have to be focused and try to get the best out of our players and with the situation where Canada had us down 2-0, we had to really fight and the youngsters had to show their true character, willpower and determination."

Despite coming out on the losing end, Canadian coach Stephen Hart hoped that his team had learned a lesson from the defeat.

"I think that tonight was a very valuable lesson for us - the game is 90 minutes long," said Hart.

"They (Jamaica) scored on two very, very good set plays and we just lacked that little bit of concentration to win the game and that is how football is.

"We should have been stronger mentally and it should have been no big thing, but it's a learning lesson."

Earlier in the consolation final Bermuda went down 3-2 during a penalty shoot-out against Barbados after the two teams had battled to a 1-1 deadlock at the end of regulation time.

Barbados, finally picking up their first win of the four-match tournament, gratefully accepted the triumph.

"I feel good about it!" exclaimed Barbados coach Colin Hayward. "In all fairness, I really think that we wanted to win one in Bermuda because Bermuda is a nice country and although the guys lost three matches and were really feeling down they still wanted to bring one (win) home for Barbados."

Despite finishing fourth, Bermuda assistant coach Scott Morton, said: "This has certainly been a learning experience for them (Bermuda team) and believe me, they learned a lot of lessons from this situation - especially coming into the match because they were a little bit down after having not reached the finals."

Afterwards, during the awards ceremony at which CONCACAF and FIFA vice-president Austin (Jack) Warner was present among a host of Bermuda Football Association officials, Canada were presented with the tournament's fair play award.

Voted best defender was Canadian Trevor Depippo and top goalscorers were Angus Burke and Cam Wilson, also of Canada.

Jamaican Seon Giveans was named the tournament's most valuable player and best midfielder while Barbados took home the best goalkeeper award.