Sheppard tricks SP Boyz in NLC tourney

Shep­pard who at­tends Pre­sen­ta­tion Col­lege of San Fer­nan­do was vot­ed as the 2019 Sec­ondary Schools Foot­ball League af­ter his 14 goals on the sea­son helped claimed the Co­ca-Co­la South zone In­ter­Col crown and first-ever Na­tion­al In­ter­Col ti­tle for his school.

The trio of Ezekiel Ke­sar, Yohan Ro­mano, and Rae­sean Paul were al­so on tar­get for De­porti­vo P.F Youths who will now meet Gas­par­il­lo Youths in the semi­fi­nals at the Ma­yaro Recre­ation Ground on Feb­ru­ary 8 from 1.45 pm, while MaGuaya Unit­ed and DCS/Dass Trace clash in the sec­ond semi­fi­nal from 3.45 pm. Ma­lik Phillip net­ted the lone item for SP Boyz.

On Sun­day last in the fi­nal quar­ter­fi­nal at the Man­nie Ramjohn Sta­di­um, Mara­bel­la Field 1, Gas­par­il­lo Youth won for the 11th straight match, a come-from-be­hind 2-1 tri­umph against All Blacks FC.

Jaden Grant fired All Blacks FC ahead but Gas­par­il­lo Youths got strikes from Ri­car­do Williams and Nikel Rawl­ins to se­cure the win.

DCS/Dass Trace got the bet­ter of Trend­set­ter Hawks 7-6 on sud­den-death penal­ty kicks af­ter a goal­less draw in their last-eight match-up while MaGuaya Unit­ed whipped Mas­call Foot­ball Acad­e­my 3-1.

For MaGuaya Unit­ed, Isa Bram­ble an­oth­er stand­out in the 2019 SS­FL Pre­mier Di­vi­sion for Na­pari­ma Col­lege net­ted two goals while Deck­lan Mar­celle added the third item to can­cel out Matthew-Lee Cum­mings' re­ply for Mas­call Foot­ball Acad­e­my.

Fol­low­ing the semi­fi­nals on Sat­ur­day, the third-place and cham­pi­onship games are sched­uled to be played at the Man­nie Ramjohn Sta­di­um on Feb­ru­ary 16.

Teams in the tour­na­ment are vy­ing for $10,000 in cash prizes spon­sored by Next Lev­el Con­sult­ing Lim­it­ed, as well as, the cham­pi­onship tro­phy, medals, and oth­er prizes, while the “Most Valu­able Play­er” (MVP) of the tour­na­ment will be go­ing on tri­al in the Cana­di­an Pro­fes­sion­al League with the Hal­i­fax Wan­der­ers.

The win­ners will col­lect $5,000 while the sec­ond-place fin­ish­er gets $3,000 and third and fourth, $1,500 and $500 re­spec­tive­ly.

Tour­na­ment or­ga­niz­ers are ex­treme­ly thank­ful to spon­sors, Ram­lo­gan & Sons Sports (Cou­va & Mara­bel­la), Ram­s­ingh Sports­world, and Mar­itime Fi­nan­cial Group

Next Lev­el Con­sult­ing, Lim­it­ed is a reg­is­tered lo­cal small busi­ness spe­cial­iz­ing in res­i­den­tial and com­mer­cial se­cu­ri­ty cam­eras, alarms, and gate mo­tors. We wish to in­vite oth­er busi­ness­es, big and small, to in­vest in youth, foot­ball and our lo­cal com­mu­ni­ties.

Quar­ter­fi­nal Re­sults

On Sat­ur­day (Ma­haica Oval, Pt Fortin)

DCS/Dass Trace 0 vs Trend­set­ter Hawks 0
- DCS/Dass Trace won 7-6 on sud­den-death penal­ty-kicks

De­porti­vo P.F. Youths 6 (Jaiye Shep­pard 3, Ezekiel Ke­sar, Yohan Ro­mano, Rae­sean Paul) vs SP Boyz 1 (Ma­lik Phillip)

On Sun­day (Man­nie Ramjohn Sta­di­um, Mara­bel­la Field 1)

MaGuaya Unit­ed 3 (Isa Bram­ble 2, Deck­lan Mar­celle) vs Mas­call Foot­ball Acad­e­my 1 (Matthew-Lee Cum­mings)

Gas­par­il­lo Youths 2 (Ri­car­do Williams, Nikel Rawl­ins) vs All Blacks FC 1 (Jaden Grant)

Next Lev­el Con­sult­ing Lim­it­ed U-19 Di­vi­sion Com­mu­ni­ty In­vi­ta­tion­al Foot­ball Tour­na­ment:

Fi­nal Pool Stand­ings

Pool A

Teams*P*W*D*L*F*A*Pts
MaGuaya Unit­ed*6*5*0*1*24*7*16
SP Boyz*6*3*0*3*15*18*9
Trend­set­ter Hawks*6*1*2*3*15*15*5
Hearts of Mal­oney*6*1*1*4*9*23*4

Pool B

Teams*P*W*D*L*F*A*Pts
Gas­par­il­lo Youths*10*10*0*0*25*7*30
DCS/Dass Trace*10*6*1*3*17*9*19
De­porti­vo P.F Youths*10*4*1*5*21*12*13
Mas­call F.A*10*4*1*5*14*13*13
All Blacks FC*10*3*0*7*8*19*9
P/Town Achiev­ers*10*1*1*8*8*31*4

Up­com­ing Match­es

Semi­fi­nals (Feb­ru­ary 8.)

Venue: Ma­yaro Recre­ation Ground:

Gas­par­il­lo Youths vs De­porti­vo P.F. Youths, 1.45 pm

MaGuaya Unit­ed vs DCS/Dass Trace, 3.45 pm

RELATED NEWS

NLCB supports UTT sports programme.
By JELANI BECKLES (NEWSDAY).

NATIONAL Lotteries Control Board (NLCB) has pumped almost $150,000 in funds to the sporting programme at the University of TT (UTT). The funds will help the university’s men’s and women’s football teams purchase uniforms for their trip to Mexico for the International University Sports Federation (FISU) Americas Tournament from May 31 to June 10.

Last Thursday, a cheque worth $145,000 was handed over by NLCB to UTT at the NLCB corporate box at the Queen’s Park Oval in St Clair.

Susan Worrell, marketing and public relations officer at NLCB, attended the press conference.

Eight men’s and women’s teams will compete in the tournament in Mexico with the top two teams in each category advancing to the International University World Cup in China in 2021. Universities from Canada, Brazil, Argentina, Mexico, Colombia and the US will also be represented in the qualifying tournament.

Ian Pritchard, senior manager of sports and recreation at the high performance programme at UTT, said, “We are extremely grateful and very, very thankful to NLCB for their assistance towards not just our sporting teams but to help with us with the development of our young athletes that we work to develop towards making them national athletes.” NLCB’s funding will be mainly used to buy uniforms for the sports teams at UTT that include football, netball, cricket, basketball, volleyball, track and field and table tennis.

Pritchard said UTT will be taking on fund raising initiatives for the Mexico trip including a virtual 5K, a soccer picnic, a boat ride and a barbeque.

Pritchard is counting on financial support so UTT can continue developing national athletes. “We have the track record to show how many national athletes we have created and developed in every discipline of sport at UTT.”

Several top local and regional athletes have attended UTT including T&T table tennis ace Curtis Humphreys, T&T netballer Samantha Wallace, West Indies leg spinner Hayden Walsh Jnr and a number of national volleyball players. UTT also has top coaches at their disposal including former West Indies cricketer Tony Gray and former national footballer Clayton Morris.