Big Yard clinched the $15,000 top prize in the 12-team 2023 edi­tion of the Care­nage All-Star Com­mu­ni­ty Foot­ball League (CASCFL) Tour­na­ment af­ter a hard-fought 3-1 win over Mt Pleas­ant at the Care­nage Recre­ation Ground on Haig Street on Thurs­day night.

Go­ing in­to the match, Big Yard need­ed a draw to emerge as cham­pi­ons af­ter Back Ah Yard drew lev­el at the top of the ta­ble on Tues­day af­ter a 2-2 draw with One Unit­ed to move to 26 points, but with a su­pe­ri­or goal-dif­fer­ence of plus-26 to plus-20.

How­ev­er, mid­way through the first half, Ron­dell Gib­son calmed the nerves of the vo­cal Big Yard sup­port­ers when he fired in the open­er past goal­keep­er An­tho­ny Al­leyne, which his team held un­til the half-time whis­tle.

But mid­way through the sec­ond half, Mt Pleas­ant dent­ed Big Yard ti­tle hopes when Fer­gus Thomas con­vert­ed from the penal­ty spot to even the match at 1-1 and swung the ti­tle des­ti­na­tion back in Back Ah Yard's favour.

The Big Yard sup­port­ers were once again in a bois­ter­ous mood when Tyrese Bai­ley re­stored their lead be­fore Haile Beck­les sealed the win with the third item to push their points tal­ly to 29 from 11 match­es, two ahead of Back Ah Yard, who col­lect­ed $10,000 as run­ners-up while third-placed Role Mod­els earned $6,000.

This year, some $45,000 in cash prizes is on of­fer in the com­pe­ti­tion spon­sored by Prime Min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley, MP for Diego Mar­tin West, bpTT, and the Min­istry of Sport and Com­mu­ni­ty De­vel­op­ment.

For the knock­out tour­na­ment, which kicks off to­day, the cham­pi­ons will take home $10,000 and the los­ing fi­nal­ist $5,000.

Care­nage All Stars Com­mu­ni­ty League re­sults:

Oc­to­ber 5: Big Yard 3 (Ron­dell Gib­son, Tyrese Bai­ley, Haile Beck­les) vs Mt Pleas­ant 1 (Fer­gus Thomas pen)

Oct 3: Back Ah Yard 2 (Clint Hospedales, Joshua Leach) vs One Unit­ed 2 (Du­ane Muck­ette 2)

Oct 2: Scor­pi­on 0 vs 13 Posse 0

Sep­tem­ber 30: Role Mod­els 5 (Alvin Jones 2, Jer­cole Pierre, Shevy Hamil­ton, Eli­jah Seechan) vs One Unit­ed 0

Sept 29: Mt Pleas­ant 4 (Kah­sif St Louis, Jon­ny Nor­eiga, Mic­ah Lan­siquot, Samuel Delice) vs 13 Posse 2 (Kishun Seecha­ran, Jo­evin Jones)

Sept 28: Back Ah Yard 4 (Ka­reem Fre­itas, Joshua Leech, Ak­il Thomas, Clevon Mc Fee) vs Scor­pi­on 1 (Josi­ah Robert­son)

Sept 27: Role Mod­els 2 vs Po­sei­don 0

Sept 26: 13 Posse 3 vs Cul­tur­al Roots 0 - by de­fault

Cur­rent stand­ings:

Place* Teams*P*W*D*L*F*A*Pts

1*Big Yard*11*9*2*0*35*13*29

2*Back Ah Yard*11*8*2*1*42*16*26

3*Role Mod­els*11*8*1*2*29*10*25

4*Mt Pleas­ant*11*6*1*4*28*20*19

5*One Unit­ed*11*5*2*4*23*21*17

6*13 Possie*11*4*3*4*19*20*15

7*Sime­on Road*11*4*1*6*16*14*13

8*1st En­giner­ing*11*4*0*7*14*28*12

9*Ze­bu­lun Utd*11*3*1*7*6*22*10

10*Scor­pi­on*11*2*4*5*15*27*10

11*Cul­tur­al Roots*11*2*0*9*12*29*6

12*Po­sei­don*11*1*3*7*11*22*6

Up­com­ing League match­ers:

Open­ing round of knock­out:

To­day: Po­sei­don vs Ze­bu­lun Unit­ed, 7 pm

To­mor­row: 1st En­giner­ing vs Back Ah Yard, 7 pm; Sime­on Road vs One Unit­ed, 9 pm

Wednes­day: Big Yard vs Scor­pi­on, 7 pm; 13 Possie vs Mt Pleas­ant, 9 pm