Nigel Si­mon

Strik­er Run­dell Win­ches­ter con­tin­ued his rich vein of form with a hat-trick as new­ly crowned First Cit­i­zens Cup cham­pi­on Cen­tral FC end­ed the three-match Dig­i­cel T&T Pro League win streak of new­com­er Point Fortin Civic FC in con­vinc­ing fash­ion, 3-0 on Tues­day night.

This was in the fea­ture match of a dou­ble-head­er at the Ato Boldon Sta­di­um in Cou­va where Di­recTV W Con­nec­tion had ear­li­er ex­tend­ed its league 100 per cent win­ning record to four match­es, with a 2-0 de­feat of North East Stars thanks to sec­ond-half goals from Jer­rel Brit­to (67th) and Jo­evin Jones (71st), re­spec­tive­ly.

The win im­proved W Con­nec­tion to max­i­mum 12 points, three clear of Pt Fortin Civic while Cen­tral FC jumped over Stars and in­to third with sev­en points from three match­es.

With the "Savonet­ta Boys" win in the open­ing con­test at Cou­va, the pres­sure was on Pt Fortin Civic to do like­wise and stop the con­fi­dent Cen­tral FC "Sharks" still bask­ing in the glo­ry of their 2-1 First Cit­i­zens Cup fi­nal win over De­fence Force at the Hase­ly Craw­ford Sta­di­um in Mu­cu­rapo on Fri­day.

How­ev­er, Win­ches­ter, re­cent­ly capped by the se­nior na­tion­al team in a 0-0 in­ter­na­tion­al friend­ly with New Zealand–and com­ing off a man-of-the-match per­for­mance in the First Cit­i­zens Cup fi­nal–had oth­er ideas and got goals in an eight-minute space on ei­ther side of the in­ter­val to si­lence the vis­i­tors.

The 19-year-old Win­ches­ter, signed by Cen­tral FC's Ter­ry Fen­wick ear­li­er this year in the Jan­u­ary trans­fer-win­dow from To­ba­go's Stoke­ly Vale af­ter a stel­lar-show­ing in the T&T Foot­ball Fed­er­a­tion FA Tro­phy com­pe­ti­tion and Toy­ota Clas­sic, got his first in the 21st minute. He then added oth­er items, one minute in­to the sec­ond-half and three min­utes lat­er against debu­tant goal­keep­er Miguel Payne, who got the starter's nod ahead of na­tion­al goal­keep­er Mar­vin Phillip, the cap­tain of the Cen­tral FC team last sea­son, be­fore his switch.

Speak­ing af­ter the match Cen­tral FC coach, Eng­lish­man Ter­ry Fen­wick, a three-time league win­ner with San Juan Jabloteh said he was still dis­ap­point­ed in the chances that his side gave Point Fortin.

"The match could have been 7-3 be­cause of all the chances on both sides, but I like the way we are shap­ing up. We have played all of the top teams in the league, whether it's in the league or knock­out, and we are still un­de­feat­ed," said Fen­wick.

"Our boys are gain­ing strength and con­fi­dence as we go along, be­cause we are still a very young team, and we're all lo­cal."

Jorsling fires De­fence Force to first win

Down at Mu­cu­rapo, out-of-favour na­tion­al strik­er, De­vorn Jorsling, over­came a glar­ing miss by scor­ing twice and set­ting up the oth­er for strug­gling de­fend­ing cham­pi­on De­fence Force, to twice come-from-be­hind and de­feat Neal & Massy Cale­do­nia AIA, 3-2.

Go­ing in­to the en­counter be­tween last year's top two teams, both coach­es were still in search of their first league vic­to­ries and by the end of the night, it was two-time win­ning league coach Ross Rus­sell who was smil­ing.

On the oth­er hand, Cale­do­nia's Ja­maal Shabazz was left to rue an­oth­er dis­ap­point­ing re­sult, as his club is yet to win in nine match­es for the 2013/2014 sea­son.

But the night had start­ed on a bright note for Cale­do­nia when an­oth­er out-of-favour T&T strik­er, Ja­maal Gay, slid home the open­er from a Den­sill Theobald left-sided cen­tre in the sec­ond-minute.

Jorsling then muffed an easy chance for De­fence Force when he some­how lift­ed a right-sided cross on­to the cross­bar from less than six yards out.

How­ev­er, he made amends in a very for­tu­itous man­ner when he charged down an in­tend­ed clear­ance from Cale­do­nia Grena­di­an goal­keep­er Shemel Loui­sion in­to an un­guard­ed net for a 1-1 score at the in­ter­val.

Two min­utes af­ter the restart, Cale­do­nia re­gained the lead with Gay net­ting his sec­ond af­ter he cut off an in­tend­ed back pass for goal­keep­er Shel­don Clarke to score.

Af­ter a few close miss­es at both ends of the field, De­fence Force drew lev­el again from a clev­er­ly tak­en free-kick by Jorsling to Ross Rus­sell Jr, who raced out of the five-man wall to the edge of the 18-yard box and side-foot­ed a shot in­to the goal, off Loui­sion's left glove in the 72nd. Ten min­utes lat­er, Jorsling sealed the win with a gem of a free-kick off his own.

Fol­low­ing a foul by winger Ka­reem Joseph on De­fence Force's Ker­ry Joseph (no re­la­tion), down the left flank, Jorsling curled his left-foot­ed ef­fort over the wall, and across the body of the blind­ed Loui­sion and in­to the far side of the net off the post.

Ear­li­er on at Mu­cu­rapo, Ak­i­ba Pe­ters (ninth & 30th) scored twice in the first-half, while Todd Ryan (2nd) and Dwayne Salazar (90th) added one each for Po­lice to hold off San Juan Jabloteh, 4-1.

How­ev­er, Jabloteh had on­ly them­selves to blame as cap­tain Ker­ry Bap­tiste missed a 24th minute penal­ty be­fore scor­ing an­oth­er in the 69th af­ter Jevon Mor­ris scored on the stroke of the half.

Jabloteh al­so dom­i­nat­ed for long pe­ri­ods of the match, while con­vert­ing a num­ber of half-chances.

League match­es re­sume to­mor­row with a dou­ble-head­er at Cou­va fol­lowed by an­oth­er at Mar­vin Lee Sta­di­um, Ma­coya on Sat­ur­day.

Tues­day's re­sults

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Po­lice 4 (Ak­i­ba Pe­ters 9th, 30th, Todd Ryan 2nd, Dwayne Salazar 90th) vs San Juan Jabloteh 2 (Javon Mor­ris 45th, Ker­ry Bap­tiste 69th penth).

De­fence Force 3 (De­vorn Jorsling 41st, 82nd, Ross Rus­sell Jr 72nd) vs Cale­do­nia AIA 1 (Ja­mala Gay 2nd, 47th)

W Con­nec­tion 2 (Jer­rel Brit­to 67th, Jo­evin Jones 71st) vs North East Stars 0

Cen­tral FC 3 (Run­del Win­ches­ter 41st, 46th, 49th) vs Pt Fortin Civic FC 0

Teams P W D L F A Pts

W Con­nec­tion 4 4 0 0 13 2 12

Pt Fortin Civic 4 3 0 1 6 4 9

Cen­tral FC 3 2 1 0 6 1 7

North East Stars 4 2 0 2 6 4 6

Po­lice 4 1 1 2 6 8 4

Jabloteh 3 1 0 2 10 12 3

De­fence Force 3 1 0 2 5 8 3

Cale­do­nia 4 0 2 2 3 7 2

St Ann's Rangers 3 0 0 3 5 14 0