Cen­tral FC's mid-sea­son sign­ing Ataulla Guer­ra bagged a dra­mat­ic win­ning goal in a come-from-be­hind 3-2 win over De­fence Force, which kept the Sharks in con­tention for this sea­son's mil­lion-dol­lar 2013/2014 Pro League Cham­pi­onship.

Mean­while the chances of trou­bled-De­fence Force re­tain­ing the ti­tle de­te­ri­o­rat­ed. They re­main in sev­enth po­si­tion with just 17 points, less than half the tal­ly of lead­ers W Con­nec­tion (37 points). Army, how­ev­er, have five match­es in hand.

Cen­tral re­turned to sec­ond on the stand­ings with 29 points, joint with Point Fortin Civic, but ahead by goal-dif­fer­ence, while both are eight points adrift of Con­nec­tion.

Guer­ra who was side­lined for a month with a right shoul­der in­jury, scored in the fourth minute of stop­page-time to com­plete the 3-2 vic­to­ry at the Lar­ry Gomes Sta­di­um.

But De­fence Force, who lost de­fend­er Rodell El­cock to a sec­ond yel­low card for a push on Cen­tral's Dar­ren Mitchell four min­utes from the end, had en­joyed a two-goal cush­ion be­fore the break. Strik­er De­vorn Jorsling, clear­ly in­spired to do well in ho­n­our of close friend and for­mer team­mate Kevon Carter, who died of a heart at­tack two Fri­days ago and was buried two days ago, scored twice.

Coach Ross Rus­sell and his men, on an emo­tion­al re­turn, looked set for a win against the side that de­feat­ed them 3-1 in Round One and 2-0 three weeks ago in Round Two.

Jorsling first con­vert­ed from the spot in the 17th minute to beat goal­keep­er Jan-Michael Williams from the spot for a 1-0 army ad­van­tage af­ter ref­er­ee Ce­cil Hinds award­ed the penal­ty fol­low­ing a hand­ball in­side the area by El­ton John.

And, in the 24th minute, Jorsling ex­e­cut­ed a vol­ley, beat­ing Williams a sec­ond time for a 2-0 score. Coach Ter­ry Fen­wick re­spond­ed with a dou­ble sub­sti­tu­tion at the start of the sec­ond pe­ri­od, re­plac­ing mid­field­er Le­ston Paul with Guer­ra, and for­mer De­fence Force play­er, Samuel Delice, with Run­dell Win­ches­ter.

A cheeky pass in the 47th minute by Plaza beat­ing de­fend­er Devin Jor­dan, al­lowed Dar­ren Mitchell to swoop in, round goal­keep­er Clarke, and hit in­to an open net to re­duce the deficit 1-2.

And when a Plaza' cross found its way to the boot of Mitchell in the 72nd minute, the To­bag­on­ian's crack across the six yard area was turned in by Mar­cano to tie the scores at 2-2.

On the oth­er end Mar­cano was de­nied a sec­ond, ten min­utes from time, by Clarke, who al­so made a save against Guer­ra in the sec­ond minute of stop­page time. But even­tu­al­ly the De­fence Force goal­keep­er con­ced­ed the dread­ed Guer­ra's strike from the top of the area to suf­fer de­feat.

The sol­diers will re­turn to ac­tion to­day at the Ato Boldon Sta­di­um in a resched­uled Round Two Match Day Four fix­ture against Cale­do­nia AIA from 9 pm, fol­low­ing a 7 pm resched­uled Round Two Match Day Nine clash be­tween North East Stars and Po­lice FC.

Re­sults

Fri­day

Point Fortin Civic 3 (Mar­cus Joseph 21st, An­dre Tou­s­saint 38th, Kariym Balt­haz­ar 90th+) v Po­lice FC 0

North East Stars 3 (Trevin Cas­esar 7th, 61st, Kennedy Hink­son 87th) v Cale­do­nia AIA 2 (Den­sill Theobald 32nd, 85th)

Sat­ur­day

W Con­nec­tion 2 (Shah­don Win­ches­ter 19th, 57th) v St Ann's Rangers 0

Sun­day

Cen­tral FC (Dar­ren Mitchell 47th, Ja­son Mar­cano 72nd, Ataulla Guer­ra 90th+4) v De­fence Force 2 (De­vorn Jorsling 17th pen, 24th)

Fix­tures

To­day

North East Stars v Po­lice FC, Ato Boldon Sta­di­um, Cou­va, 7 pm

Cale­do­nia AIA v De­fence Force, 9 pm

STAND­INGS

Teams Pld W D L F A Pts

W Con­nec­tion 16 11 4 1 32 9 37

Point Fortin Civic 16 9 2 5 26 16 29

Cen­tral FC 17 7 8 2 31 17 29

North East Stars 16 7 5 4 17 12 26

Po­lice FC 15 6 3 6 19 23 21

Cale­do­nia AIA 16 5 6 5 24 19 21

De­fence Force 12 5 2 5 21 20 17

San Juan Jabloteh 16 3 2 11 19 37 11

St Ann's Rangers 16 1 0 15 11 47 3