Four different players were on target as former champion Police opened its campaign in the Santa Cruz Football Cup with a 4-0 thrashing of La Pastora at the Brian Lara Recreation Ground, Sam Boucaud, Lower Santa Cruz on Sunday.
Former T&T winger, Noel Williams, Hayden Jones, Todd Ryan and Steven Stoute were the players scoring in the win for the lawmen. Other comfortable winners included, Sam Boucaud, Real Pipiol and Cantaro United while Hots Shots and Macoya had narrow victories, both over North Coast United.
Jerlike George and former T&T striker Kerry Baptiste scored two goals each to lead Sam Boucaud past Nazarene FC 5-1; Hector Sam, another former T&T international, Adam Ruben and Warren Straker netted for Real Pipiol in its 3-0 blanking of Victors, and Cantaro trounced San Juan Youths 4-0.
Hot Shots pipped North Coast United 1-0 on a strike from Jessi Rampersad, and Tahir Liverpool and Darrel Seetahal scored to cancel out Christon Thomas effort to secure Macoya’s 2-1 win over North Coast as well. This year, 24 teams are trying to dethrone River Plate, including 2011 winner Police, to win the $20,000 first prize.
The runner-up will win $10,000, third place will walk away with $5,000 and fourth place will collect $3,000 in the league competition. The 24 clubs have been broken up into six groups of four at the end of which the top two will advance to the main knockout.
The groups have been named after former players from the community, namely Gerard Craigwell, Kenneth Lester, Charlie De Bourg, Alfred Gordon, Moses Vidale and Mortimer Joseph. A knockout competition called the Garfield De Silva Cup will take place simultaneously, with the winner taking home $10,000 and second place $3,000.
No prize money will be awarded for the third and fourth place winners in the knockout competition. Registration is still open at a cost of $2,500 per team. The tournament is being sponsored by Ricky Ragoonanan Group of Companies, Beckles Environmental, UNIPET and Monteco Creations.
RESULTS
Sam Boucaud 5 (Jerlike George 2, Kerry Baptiste 2, Tevin Brathwaite) vs Nazarene FC 1 (Keron Romany)
Hot Shots 1 (Jessi Rampersad) vs North Coast Utd 0
Police 4 (Noel Williams, Hayden Jones, Todd Ryan, Steven Stoute) vs La Pastora 0
Caledonia Reserves 1 (Shaquille Holder) vs Pipiol Utd 1 (Trevis O’Brien)
Real Pipiol 3 (Hector Sam, Adam Ruben, Warren Straker) vs Victors 0
Cantaro Utd 4 vs San Juan Youths 0
VFI 2 (Josiah Alleyne, A. Shillingford) vs Malick Young Stars 2 (Frederick Commissiong, E. David)
Macoya 2 (Tahir Liverpool, Darrel Seetahal) vs North Coast 1 (Christon Thomas)