Somerset Trojans 1

Dandy Town 2

Jomar Wilkinson praised his Dandy Town team last night after their “gutsy” win over Somerset Trojans.

Goals from Jahtino Richardson-Martin and Angelo Simmons, either side of Tahj Wade’s well-taken equaliser, were enough to put Hornets into the final of the FA Cup for the second year running.

The victory also keeps Dandy Town’s exceedingly slim league and cup double hopes alive, while ending Trojans own dreams of replacing Town as the Island’s dominant team.

Wilkinson, the Dandy Town coach, admitted the opportunity to draw first blood against the club trying to take his team’s league title had been a major motivator for his players in the run-up to the game.

“Defending this title is very important, we want to defend all the titles that we have, and on the other hand it was very important for us to win this game,” Wilkinson said. “Maybe it puts a little bit of doubt in Somerset’s heads going into their last [league] game of the season, so that was part of our motivation too.

“We had a job to do and the boys done it.”

Somerset might well end up taking their rivals’ league crown, but they were second best last night and never looked like beating a Town team who needed little more than ten minutes to take the lead.

A quick free kick caught Trojans asleep in defence, Richardson-Martin raced clear down the right and his cross was smashed in by Simmons who was left unmarked inside the penalty area.

Richardson-Martin, alongside Simmons and Jahnazae Swan tormented Somerset for much of the evening, although it helped that Justin Corday and Vashun Blanchette, the Trojan midfielders, were ineffective at best.

That could be said for most of the Trojans team, and yet they might consider themselves unlucky not to have drawn level sooner than they did.

Wade scuffed a shot when put clean through by Jaz Ratteray-Smith, and moments later Lyndon Rayner, the referee, missed a blatant foul on Ratteray-Smith by George Dyer, the Town defender, inside the penalty area.

Still, Somerset’s equaliser came against the run of play and was largely the result of some quick thinking by Ratteray-Smith, whose pass split open the Trojans defence allowing Wade to race clear and clip the ball past Mikkail Crockwell, in the Hornets goal.

Wade might even have given his side the lead before the break, but his effort was just off target, and then Shaquille Bean, the Trojans goalkeeper, had to be at his best to deny Richardson-Martin as the half drew to a close.

Somerset had another chance to go ahead when Donowa’s cross was missed by the Town defence and found Wade, whose first-time shot was smothered by Crockwell.

Trojans paid a heavy price for that miss and their tendency to switch off at the back, with Richardson-Martin turning goalscorer as he deftly controlled Swan’s cross, turned inside the box, and rolled the ball past Bean.

Town were content to allow Somerset to attack them thereafter, although it nearly backfired when only Kwonde Lathan’s late intervention with his head stopped Dion Stovell’s curling shot from finding the top right-hand corner of the goal.

That was as close as Somerset got to an equaliser and Town should have then made the game safe but Swan missed an open goal after Simmons had cut in from left, leaving defenders in his wake, before cutting the ball back to his unmarked team-mate.

“They [the players] were really focused today and I’m glad for that, they showed a lot of guts today to really defend and be really resilient,” Wilkinson said.