BERMUDA'S Under-17 national soccer coach, Kenny Thompson, has spent little time basking in the glow of his team's victorious outcome at last weekend's World Cup qualifiers.

Instead he is making plans on how to square up to Cuba - Bermuda's next opponent in their hopeful march to play in the Under-17 World Cup finals in Finland next year.

And Thompson is under no illusions of the difficult task facing his young charges.

"Cuba will be very tough," he said this week.

Unlike more senior tournaments where a coach can easily scout out opponents and, at the very least, get numerous videos of their games, Thompson said that can be more difficult in the younger competitions. But he certainly wants a look at the Cuban team before the home and away matches. As it stands now Cuba will play Bermuda at the National Sports Centre on November 24 and then the second leg will be in Havana on December 8.

Cuba won Group D in their last qualifying outing last month against Suriname, the Bahamas and Aruba. In fact they showed their style by dispatching the Bahamas 5-0. One player who will be a force to be reckoned with will be striker Felix Crespo who hammered in three of Cuba's goals.

Thompson said this week: "I am very happy with the outcome of last week's matches. But now we have to plan for Cuba."

And he is hopeful that he will be able to watch his opponents before the home and away matches. "But it is possible we will go in blind. Right now I am in the process of trying to find out what activity the Cuban team are taking part in. Then we can perhaps plan to see them - it would be great to see them play live. If not we may have to rely on video but it can be very difficult at the youth level - many times we do not have a set schedule."

And Thompson said he is very upfront with coaches from other nations he wants to watch. "I tend to be very transparent. I call them directly like I did with St. Lucia. I always say that we are coming to watch. It certainly is not a spy mission. I will tell them what we are doing and if we can do something similiar for the Cuba matches it will help." The Under-17 boss said the relationship with other coaches is very good. "However I do not know anyone from Cuba," he added. "But normally the relationship is one of respect for the same job that we do. For instance if someone wanted to watch us there is no problem. We have to learn to operate at this level. We have to watch other nations and have other nations watch us. That is certainly how it is on the higher level. In the international arena there are very often no surpirses. It comes down to getting everything right tactically on the day and also the performance of the individuals. But we need to take every opportunity to see our opponents play."

But he is prepared for surprises. "There are more surprises at this level. We certainly observed St. Lucia in the first match (last week) and then saw Guyana playing Trinidad in their match. I was able to get a look at both teams and so I knew what we were facing. By the time we played Trinidad (on Sunday) I had seen them play twice. It certainly helped that I had a idea of what our opponents were like."

And while Thompson said he believed the sponsors of the team were happy with the outcome, he added that it was just an added bonus. "I am sure they are happy but I have spoken before about this being a developmental programme and as such the results are not the be all and end all. That however is not to say that we do not go into every game to win. We certainly do. We set out on this path to compete in the world championships - our ambition has to be to play in the finals and to win the championship. But having said that it is not the be all and end all. We are in this for the experience and the developement of youth players. By winning it gives the sponsors more attention. But the sponsors' money is certainly well spent with the objectives of the programme and the winning is the bonus."