HOST club Fruta Conquerors (FC) will oppose Santos Football Club in a replay of their abandoned semifinal match-up in the fourth annual National Milling Company (NAMILCO)-sponsored football festival, at the Tucville ground tomorrow night, with the winner to meet Alpha ‘The Hammer’ United in the final on Sunday. When the two first met last Saturday night at the same venue, FC were in control before a power outage forced the game to be abandoned and no doubt, both Denzil Thompson (Santos) and Sampson Gilbert (FC) would go back to the drawing board and do an analysis of the abandoned first game.
Gilbert’s FC is a youthful unit with an average age of 23, but the way they have been playing in this competition, which will have a new champion being crowned on Sunday, belies their age, as they have dominated their opponents throughout.
In-between the uprights, Gilbert has a choice of experience in Oswald Cornette or guts and glory in 19-year-old quarterfinal hero Colin Edwards, whose performance when asked to take over the mantle when Cornette was declared medically unfit for the match against Guyana Defence Force (GDF), left many speechless.
His timings and acrobatic saves brought oohs, aahs and applause from the appreciative crowd. Should the host team advance to the finals on Sunday, certainly he will be the crowd-puller, especially against the national club champions.
Skipper Jolyon Harry has been a tower of strength in the defence, receiving amicable support from Odell Williams, Mark Walton, Trevon Lythcott and Delon Williams, ably supported by the veteran Gerald Gittens and Lester Peters at midfield.
Up front, young Pernell Shultz has been a thorn in many defensive lineups so far in the tournament. His hard work on the right wing, complemented by Dwayne Lawrence and Eon Alleyne’s strike force in the middle, would certainly place Fruta Conquerors in good stead for this fixture.
On the other side of the field stand a team who have been on the rebounding path, since their disheartening showing in the just concluded Buxton Stars-organised Mackeson Stout/Digicel Sweet 16 tournament, where they bowed out to eventual winners BK International Western Tigers in the semis.
They managed to extract revenge when they sent the Tigers crashing out of this tournament with a 1-0 victory in their quarterfinal encounter, thanks to Joel Lloyd’s goal.
The black and white-clad Santos lineup includes the diminutive striker in Quacy John, with Lloyd offering support at the top, while Glenorvan Edmonds and veteran Gerald Whittington are no pushovers when faced with a one-on-one situation with the opposing side’s custodian.
Add Shemroy Arthur, William Europe, Lennox Charles, Patrice Graham and Jermaine Fraser, who showed he can score goals while marshalling the defence, and custodian O’Neil Heywood to the fray, and certainly Fruta Conquerors’ work is cut out for them.
Apart from the $500 000 cash prize and trophy to the respective winner of the competition, other individual incentives such as a computer scholarship to two promising players, a cell phone to the best custodian and a gold chain to the highest goalscorer are up for grabs.
The second-, third- and fourth-place finishers in this competition which is being sponsored in its entirety by NAMILCO will pocket $200 000, $100 000 and $50 000 respectively.