Soca Warriors defender Seon Powers scored his second goal of the season as struggling DirecTV North East Stars got its first win of the season in any competition, 1-0, over Caledonia in the Digicel T&T Pro League on Tuesday night. This was in the second match of a double-header at the Marvin Lee Stadium, Macoya, and came less than 24 hours after the sacking of head coach Shurland David following three straight losses to start the 2011/2012 campaign. Also axed were his assistants Arnold Dwarika and Lester Young as well as team physiotherapist Mitchell Jones.
Instead, Kevin Jeffrey, Stars' director of football, and Brent Sancho, the club's chief executive officer, and both former players at the club were in charge of the team on Tuesday, and had an immediate impact with regards to a positive result, thanks to Powers.In a match of a very few chances, Powers was on spot to collect a headed-down pass from fellow national player Anthony Wolfe, off a corner to beat goalkeeper Andrew Durant, with a right footer from an acute angle in the 55th minute. In Tuesday's opening match, First Citizens Cup semifinalist, Adams' Construction San Juan Jabloteh failed to repeat its win over St Ann's Rangers, five days ago and was held to 3-3 draw.
Rangers was eager to avenge last Friday's 2-1 loss in its First Citizens Cup quarterfinal and made its intention clear from early on when captain, Errol Mc Farlane Jr, fired in a sixth minute opener. That lead lasted until the 27th minute before Jabloteh's Luke Gullick drew his team level and just before the break, the San Juan club got a quick double from Willis Plaza, in the 43rd and 45th minutes for a 3-1 cushion. However, it seemed as though a stern half-time talk from Rangers' coach Anthony Streete made a big difference as striker Devon Modeste first brought his team to within one goal of its rivals, in the 49th minute before he netted the equaliser in the 67th minute, to earn his team a share of the points, its first of the season.
It was also the first league point for Jabloteh, to leave both clubs joint fourth on the table, two points behind the trio of league debutant T&TEC, W Connection and Stars. League matches now take a break until October 21 due to the First Citizens Cup semifinal (September 30) and final (October 14) as well as T&T's 2014 Fifa World Cup Brazil Concacaf qualifiers on October 7 and 11 against Bermuda and Barbados, respectively.
standings
Team P W D L GF GA Pts
T&TEC 1 1 0 0 2 1 3
W Conn 1 1 0 0 2 1 3
NE Stars 2 1 0 1 2 2 3
Jabloteh 1 0 1 0 3 3 1
Rangers 2 0 1 1 4 5 1
D/Force 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
Police 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
Caledonia 1 0 0 1 0 1 0
