WAL­TER AL­IBEY

wal­ter.al­ibey@guardian.co.tt

Trinidad North­erns and Caribs rug­by foot­ball clubs will clash to­day in the 59th edi­tion of the Bruno Browne Cup from 4 pm at Caribs Grounds of the Queen’s Park Sa­van­nah, Port-of-Spain.

North­erns won the Cup the last time the two teams met back in 2020 but Caribs have won more of the bat­tles to date. In fact, Caribs may feel they hold the ad­van­tage go­ing in­to to­day’s en­counter, hav­ing won the re­cent T&T Rug­by Foot­ball Union (TTR­FU) Rug­gera­ma tour­na­ments, putting them as the favourites.

Yes­ter­day, na­tion­al coach Jerome Poon Tip, one of the coach­es at North­erns, said his play­ers will rel­ish the ri­val­ry, com­ing just a year be­fore the team cel­e­brates its cen­ten­ni­al year.

“This Cup al­ways brings out the best in the play­ers for both teams, but I think we can gain the ad­van­tage be­cause of the depth we have in the team. We have a very strong bench and we can out­last our op­po­nents,” Poon Tip said yes­ter­day.

Co­in­ci­den­tal­ly, the match will be the first 80-minute 15s af­fair to be played for the year, since the COVID-19 pan­dem­ic stopped play for more than two years.

A North­erns’ vic­to­ry will hang heav­i­ly on the shoul­ders of cap­tain Christo­pher Hud­son and his deputy Wen­dell Fuller­ton, while in­flu­en­tial vet­er­an play­er Adam Fred­er­icks will add to the lead­er­ship roles that will be played by both Fuller­ton and Hud­son.

Poon Tip said it will be a blend of ex­pe­ri­ence and a num­ber of the new youth play­ers who joined the team re­cent­ly. Mean­while, North­erns will be­gin cel­e­bra­tions of their cen­ten­ni­al year as a team next year and Poon Tip said he wants the cel­e­bra­tion to be­gin ear­ly.

Caribs coach Richard Sta­glon said they will get the edge on their ri­val be­cause they are by far the bet­ter team.

“I think North­erns can on­ly beat us on­ly if we make mis­takes. Oth­er than that, we will def­i­nite­ly have the edge and I know North­erns will feel the same way as well,” Sta­glon ex­plained.

Though un­sure of the num­ber of times his team won the Cup, Sta­glon said that the num­ber of times Caribs have won com­pared to North­erns is nowhere near.

“Let us just say that the Bruno Browne Cup was held 50 times to date, North­erns would have won just 15 times and that is on­ly in re­cent times that they have won more Cups. Out­side of that, the ri­val­ry has been dom­i­nat­ed by Caribs. It’s not even close,” Sta­glon said.

The first Bruno Browne Cup was held back in 1963.