Nigel Si­mon

Ti­tle-hold­ers Neal & Massy Cale­do­nia AIA and 2009 win­ners Di­recTV W Con­nec­tion will lock horns in what is ex­pect­ed to be the sec­ond of two mouth-wa­ter­ing Lu­cozade Sport Goal Shield semi­fi­nals at the Mar­vin Lee Sta­di­um, Ma­coya, from 8 pm to­day.

Two hours be­fore, two-time run­ner-up De­fence Force will tack­le 2010 win­ner North East Stars for a place in the fi­nal set for May 3 or 4 at a venue to be de­ter­mined.

Last week at the same venue, the Mor­vant/Laven­tille "Stal­lions" which whipped De­fence Force 3-1 in the fi­nal last year, be­gan the de­fence of their ti­tle with a con­vinc­ing 4-1 blowout of St Ann's Rangers led by a goal each from Aubrey David, Ja­mal Gay, Aaron Lester and Nathan Lewis, and to­day, coach Jer­ry Moe will be hop­ing for a sim­i­lar per­for­mance against a youth­ful W Con­nec­tion.

The "Savonet­ta Boys," mean­while, were equal­ly as im­pres­sive in their last-eight win over Po­lice (4-0) with Hashim Ar­cia, Jer­rel Brit­to, Ste­fano Ri­js­sel and Jo­evin Jones the scor­ers and will be no doubt up for the chal­lenge as they seek their first piece of sil­ver­ware for the 2012/2013 sea­son.

Two years ago, W Con­nec­tion edged Cale­do­nia 1-0 in the quar­ter­fi­nal round, but this sea­son Moe and com­pa­ny have man­aged to play un­beat­en against the Cou­va-based club with two match­es end­ing in drawn re­sults in the Dig­i­cel T&T Pro League 1-1 and 0-0 be­fore se­cur­ing a 1-0 win in their March 8 round three league fix­ture.

Cale­do­nia, win­ners of the TTFF FA Tro­phy as well this sea­son, al­so se­cured a 1-0 win in their First Cit­i­zens Cup semi­fi­nal en route to re­tain­ing its ti­tle ear­li­er this year and will be con­fi­dent of main­tain­ing its good run of form to reach yet an­oth­er fi­nal this sea­son.

Even with­out coach Ross Rus­sell, De­fence Force, un­der the su­per­vi­sion of as­sis­tant coach Mar­vin Gor­don, was the biggest quar­ter­fi­nal round win­ners with a 6-1 win over T&TEC with main at­tack­ing quar­tet of De­vorn Jorsling (two), Kevon Carter (two), Richard "Sha­ka" Roy and Josi­mar Bel­grave, all among the goals while Stars, could on­ly man­age a 1-0 win against Cen­tral FC via an Eli­jah Man­ners first-half strike.

How­ev­er, in three league clash­es this sea­son, both teams have en­joyed one vic­to­ry each, with the oth­er be­ing drawn 3-3,in the first round af­ter Stars led 3-0.

For tonight's match against Stars, De­fence Force is al­so ex­pect­ed to see the re­turn of Rus­sell, who was a mem­ber of the na­tion­al Un­der-17 men's team tech­ni­cal staff in Pana­ma for the Con­ca­caf Un­der-17 Cham­pi­onships while Stars will be sweat­ing on the avail­abil­i­ty of main strik­er Cor­nell Glen, who limped away from his team's quar­ter­fi­nal win at the half with a sus­pect­ed groin in­jury.

The fi­nal is set for May 3 or 4 with a base of $20,000 for the cham­pi­ons and $1,000 for every goal in the quar­ter­fi­nals round, $2,000 for every goal scored in the semis, and $3,000 for every goal scored in the fi­nal.

The run­ner-up will get a base of $10,000 and $500 for every goal in the quar­ter­fi­nal round, $1,000 for every goal scored in the semis round, and $1,500 for every goal in the fi­nal.

How­ev­er, no monies will be award­ed for penal­ty kicks used to de­cide the win­ner of a match in the case of a draw.

In ad­di­tion, in­di­vid­ual prizes for the "Top Goalscor­er," "Most Out­stand­ing Play­er" and "Most Out­stand­ing Coach."

Spec­ta­tors at­tend­ing the match­es will not be left out as for a sec­ond year run­ning, one lucky sup­port­er will again re­ceive an all-ex­pens­es paid trip for two to an Eng­lish Pre­mier League match of choice, next sea­son.

Re­main­ing fix­tures

Semi­fi­nals

To­day

De­fence Force vs­North East Stars, 6 pm

Cale­do­nia AIA vsW Con­nec­tion, 8 pm