Form team JC too hot for Mona

For Jamaica College (JC) head coach Davion Ferguson, a reminder of his team’s potency at the business end of the ISSA/Manning Cup was not the chief goal. After his team’s 2-0 win over Mona High in yesterday’s opening Group One quarter-final game at Stadium East, the importance for him was simply getting a much-needed positive start against a team that made them work in the trenches.

Birthday boy Duncan McKenzie broke the deadlock in the 54th minute from the penalty spot while Shemron Phillips added another in the 68th minute as the defending champions laboured to victory, overcoming a first half which saw them not land a shot on target in the first half.

Ferguson said that while Mona’s pressure was difficult to contend with at first, tactical adjustments helped to bridge the gap and to counter effectively beyond the pressing game.

“We knew Mona would have come out with heart. They are aggressive, they press a lot. The first half we didn’t interpret the situation well. At half-time we made some adjustments and we knew that once we got it past the first line of press, we had acres behind them and acres behind the back line,” Ferguson said.

Mona had JC under pressure in the first half, however, and carved out chances although some of the shots on goal were tame.

The closest that any team got to scoring was when JC failed to capitalise on a scramble in the box which Mona goalkeeper Akeem Bernard managed to smother. While JC did not manage a shot on target in the first half, Mona’s chances did not test JC goalkeeper Denzil Smith. Matthew Hibbert had a low drive that trickled to Smith and Keneldo Brown’s effort was also tame which Smith easily gathered.

The second half was more of the same although Hibbert managed to sting the palms of Smith in the first five minutes after the restart. But JC would get the break they needed in the 53rd minute after they were awarded a penalty for a Mona challenge inside the box. McKenzie calmly dispatched the spot kick to give the reigning champions the lead.

INCREASED PRESSURE

From there JC increased the pressure and were rewarded with a second with 22 minutes left to play as Shemron Phillips tapped home from close range after Mona blocked the initial shot by Tarick Ximinies.

Mona High head coach Craig Butler said that it was not a matter of a decrease in their intensity which cost them but not being calm in the second half.

“We still had the tempo of the game. What we lost was our composure. Composure is very important in football and it wasn’t that they got stronger or better than us,” Butler said. “The passes weren’t coming like we were putting in the first half and we weren’t taking on the defenders one on one.”

While Mona could not muster a shot on target after Hibbert’s earlier effort, they did manage to create some opportunities in the final 15 minutes but could not get the final shot on target. Some great interplay found Brown free but his shot was blocked. And on their subsequent next possession, they could not carve out a shooting chance in the penalty area.

Even with the good start, Ferguson said that the team still has a gear more to reach but emphasised the importance of not falling behind early in the quarter-finals.

“We are not at our fluid best. We are still trying to build towards the end. But I think it’s important to start positively, start with a good result. And I think today was about getting the three points more than anything else,” Ferguson said.

JC have now won five games without conceding a goal and McKenzie says that they are on the right track as they pursue back-to-back titles.

“We have roughly four more games to win the title. We are just taking it one step at a time and our performances are getting better,” McKenzie said.