T&T in­ter­na­tion­al de­fend­er Aubrey David and his De­porti­vo Sapris­sa will go in­to their semi­fi­nal play­off the Cos­ta Ri­can Pre­mier Di­vi­sion ‘Clausura’ against CS Cartagines with some con­cerns af­ter end­ing the reg­u­lar sea­son, win­less in four match­es.

This af­ter the 29-year-old Guyana-born David was an un­used sub­sti­tute in his team's fi­nal round 2-0 loss at cel­lar-placed on La U Uni­ver­si­tar­ios on Wednes­day.

When the Cos­ta Ri­ca league re­sumed on May 20, the first to do so in Latin Amer­i­ca, De­porti­vo Sapris­sa won their first three match­es against CS Here­di­ano (1-0), San­tos De Guapiles (4-2) and Limon FC (1-0).

How­ev­er, Sapris­sa was then held to three straight 2-2 draw by LD Ala­jue­lense, ADR Jicar­al Ser­co­ba and Mu­nic­i­pal be­fore go­ing down the bot­tom-placed team to raise alarms ahead of the semi­fi­nals.

De­spite the loss, De­porti­vo Sapris­sa end­ed the 22-rounds reg­u­lar-sea­son with 45 points, five clear of Aper­tu­ra Di­vi­sion win­ners' CS Here­di­ano and bit­ter-ri­val LD Ala­jue­lense while CS Cartagines end­ed fourth with 35 points.

When the semi­fi­nal round home-and-away se­ries kicks off to­mor­row, Cartagines will be at home for the first match against Sapris­sa at the Es­ta­dio Jose Rafael "Fel­lo" Meza Ivankovich, Carta­go from 3 pm (TT time) with the re­turn-leg set for Wednes­day at the Es­ta­dio Ri­car­do Sapris­sa Ay­ma, San Jose.

Sapris­sa will start as favourites de­spite the poor run of form to end the sea­son hav­ing won both their Clausura en­coun­ters 2-1 on Jan­u­ary 19 and 3-1, March 7.

By fin­ish­ing as reg­u­lar-sea­son win­ners, Sapris­sa now has two chances at get­ting to the "Big fi­nal". Should Sapris­sa win the home-and-away semi­fi­nal se­ries they will qual­i­fy straight to the "Big-Fi­nal" against the win­ner of the oth­er se­ries be­tween Aper­tu­ra cham­pi­on CS Here­di­ano and run­ner-up LD Ala­jue­lense which al­so takes place to­mor­row, and Wednes­day.

How­ev­er, if Sapris­sa los­es in the semi­fi­nal play­offs, the two semi­fi­nal win­ners will then meet in a ‘Small-Fi­nal’ with the win­ner to meet reg­u­lar-sea­son ta­ble-top­per Sapris­sa in the "Big Fi­nal" to de­ter­mine the over­all cham­pi­on of the Clausura.