'Cole world' - Striker's late winner moves St Catherine into second place

St Catherine High school coach, Anthony Patrick, said a draw would have hurt his team's chances of making the next round after Jevaughn Cole's late winner gave them a 1-0 win over Kingston Technical (KT) in their ISSA/FLOW Group D Manning Cup game at Deanery Road field yesterday.

The visiting St Catherine bossed possession for the most part and wasted some good opportunities to break the deadlock and had to rely on Cole's last-gasp winner to claim all three points, which put them five points adrift of leaders St George's College in second place.

"Definitely (a draw would have hurt us). We kept KT in the game too long when we should have killed off the game from the first half. We played around, and anytime we play teams at the bottom of the table, we play like them," he said.

"But we go second in the standings, we lead Vauxhall and KT by a point, and we go to Vauxhall on Monday, so we definitely have to go there and get three points also," he added.

St Catherine controlled the game from the opening whistle and wasted chances through Paul Dante and Joel Simpson, while Joshua Walters had the two best chances for Kingston Tech. However, in the last 10 minutes, St Catherine were relentless, with Dushane Dawkins having his shot cleared off the line, before Assain Brown rattled the bar from the same play.

BROKE DEADLOCK

But after coming close on a number of set-plays, St Catherine finally broke the deadlock when Cole stabbed home Maleke Miller's free kick five minutes from time.

Walters and Lennario Henry both had great chances to earn Kingston Tech a point, but both failed to beat Raheem Henry in goal from close range. But now that they are in second spot, Patrick says they intend to at least consolidate that position.

"We have to take our time work and see what we can get out of it. We reach quarter-final last year and we don't want to fall short, so we are going to push as hard as we can," he stated.

Meanwhile, the tournament continues this afternoon with games in Group A, B, E, and G. The feature game of the day will see Group E leaders, Kingston College, taking on former winners Excelsior at Stadium East. In other Group E matches, Spanish Town entertain Norman Manley, and Ardenne play Greater Portmore.