On the heels of a poor showing against Grenada, Jamaica's troubling low FIFA world ranking continues to be a sore point which plagues the mind of national technical director Rene Simoes.

The national team, once ranked as high as 27 in the world under Simoes in August of 1998, has since experienced landslide slippage in the international charts, especially over the last three years. In fact the team currently ranked 98th, reached an all-time low of 105 in May of this year, which has lead to a number of unpleasant consequences for the Boyz.

Chief among them is the fact that local players already plying their trade in England or wishing to do so, will not be granted work permits by the UK Home Office, based on a stipulation, which states that in order for foreign internationals to ply their trade in the United Kingdom their national team must be ranked at least an average 70 over the last two years. In that light, a 2-1 loss to Grenada was a disastrous result for the Reggae Boyz in more ways than one.

"You cannot play against Grenada and lose the game. As a professional you must be vexed. If you are not a professional then no problem it doesn't make a difference," said Simoes.

"The loss makes a big difference to us though because it affects the FIFA rank, the players who need to renew their work permits in England will continue to have a tough time.

"In addition to that we also have problems getting invited to play quality games so we can't forget the game - we have to learn from it, move on and do better." he added. Recently, the Jamaicans have seen a few high profile international matches fail to materialise, the most recent an encounter expected to take place against Argentina earlier this month. Instead of facing the Reggae Boyz, Argentina opted to play CONCACAF rivals Mexico and the United States.

In July of last year, the national team, then under the guidance of Serbian technical director Velibor Milutinovic, had its worst drop in history. The team plummeted some 32 places after a disastrous tour of Asia.