… Sunburst Camptown and Fruta Conquerors meet for third place
A NEW champion will be crowned tonight at the Tucville playfield, when the fourth annual NAMILCO Football Festival culminates with national club champions Alpha ‘The Hammer’ United and underdogs Santos Football Club battling for supremacy and the $500 000 first prize that comes with it. It will be a battle of the orange juices for the third-place playoff, when Sunburst Camptown and host team Fruta Conquerors meet from 18:00 h, with the winner carting off $100 000 along with bragging rights for the better product.
Alpha’s path to this stage of the competition was an easy one as they defeated Milerock, Rosignol United and Sunburst Camptown, while Santos sent Pele, reigning Kashif and Shanghai champions BK International Western Tigers and host team Fruta Conquerors packing out of the competition in that order.
For tonight’s encounter, national captain Howard Lowe, who will also don the captain’s arm band for ‘The Hammer’ team, will be looking to players Kelvin McKenzie, Issa McPherson, Solomon Austin, Philbert Moffat and national custodian Ronson Williams to thwart Santos’ raids on their goal area.
Up front will be Dwight Peters, Anthony ‘Awo’ Abrams, Andrew Murray Jr, Dwain Jacobs, Shevaughn Seaforth and Shawn Bishop who can all destroy any defence in place for any local team irrespective of the place, time and date of the match, as they have done so on numerous previous occasions.
But Santos will be looking to prove a point to those who felt they should not have reached thus far in the tournament. In their replayed semi-final fixture last Wednesday, they defeated the host team 1-0.
Lennox Charles, Jermaine Fraser, Mark Glasgow and Patrice Graham marshalled the defence well with O’Neil Heywood doing a marvellous job between the uprights since their exit from the Mackeson Stout/Digicel Sweet 16 tournament which was concluded earlier this month.
They will be without the services of Glenorvan Edmonds who picked up a red card in the replayed fixture, but can rely on Shemroy Arthur, Kester Jacobs, William Europe, Joel Lloyd, Kwesi John, Michael Pedro and the veteran Gerald Whittington to lead their challenge in their bid to avoid picking up the $200 000 second place tab.
Certainly, Fruta Conquerors coach Gilbert Sampson must have regretted playing first-choice custodian Oswald Cornette over Colin Edwards, since it was the exemplary performance of the latter that enabled his team to reach the final four of the tournament before they bowed out to Santos.
To their throng of supporters, whichever custodian is used tonight is of no importance as they will only be battling for bragging rights against a team that is on the rebounding path of football in the Capital City.
The youthful Fruta Conquerors lineup will be led by Gerald Gittens who marshals the midfield with authority, with support from Lester Peters, Pernell Schultz, Trevon Lythcott, Travis Hyman, Dwayne Lawrence and skipper Jolyon Harry.
For Sunburst Camptown, Rishawn Sandiford will continue to lead their challenge with valuable support from Troy ‘Bugsy’ Prescod, Telson McKinnon, Lance Rolston and the always dangerous Nigel ‘Powers’ Codrington, with Maurice Prince being the man in charge of the uprights.
Individual prizes for the best goalkeeper, most valuable player (MVP), highest goalscorer and computer scholarships for two young promising players will be handed out at the presentation ceremony which takes place after the final whistle is blown to culminate the tournament.
Managing Director of NAMILCO, Bert Sukhai, along with some of his members of staff will be on hand to witness tonight’s action and assist with the distribution of prizes to the various winners.