Veteran striker Aljame Zuill has nailed his Colts' colours to the mast ahead of this year's Charity Cup clash with former club Devonshire Cougars declaring: "Cougars are my boys, but Colts are my family."

Zuill will be leading the line for Colts in tomorrow's Devonshire derby, which will signal the end of a lengthy period of inactivity between the famous old rivals, writes Stephen Wright.

He re-joined his boyhood club from Cougars at the start of last season and proceeded to blitz his way to 35 goals to help Colts to a unprecedented treble, consisting of the First Division title, Shield and FA Cup.

But despite now plying his trade in the orange half of Devonshire, Zuill admits he still holds plenty of affection for his ex-club where he spent three enjoyable years of his career. "The Charity Cup is going to have plenty of added spice for me as Cougars are my other team — they're still my boys," said Zuill.

"They (the players) kind of told me to stay away from them this week and they've been giving me a bit of stick as well. But I told them that I'd see them on Saturday.

"It should be a good game of football and I can't wait as I'm looking forward to putting one over my old team-mates. I know a lot of the guys like Kwame Steede and played with their coach Shawn Smith — I still talk to most of them, to be honest.

"I played for Cougars back in 1997 and the two seasons before I came back to Colts — I view them both as my teams.

"Cougars knew that Colts are my home team so they understood when I re-signed for them, but if I had gone elsewhere I think they would have been pretty annoyed at me. I miss playing for them, but I came back home."

With coach Ray Jones strengthening his ranks with the likes of Quincy Aberdeen, from Somerset Trojans, Marvin Belboda, from Paget, and former Cougar Sean Perichief, Zuill is confident Colts have found the right blend of youth and experience.

"Last season was superb, winning three trophies, and I enjoyed it because we had a lot of young guys playing for us. But now we've a lot of older guys back to help us out on our return to the Premier Division.

"We're trying to mix the old with the new and I'm sure it's going to work out all right for us this season."

Coach Ray Jones envisages the experienced Zuill playing his part in nurturing the Colts' young charges, as well as easing their transition back into top-flight football.

"Aljame came up through our youth ranks and has probably been the most prolific goalscorer in Bermuda over the last ten years," said Jones.

"He went over to Devonshire Cougars for two seasons but came back to us last year. That's the one thing with the Colts, we're like a family — players always come back.

"People always have reasons to move on but he didn't leave in a bad manner and knew the door was always open for him to come back. I think he wanted to give something back to the Colts as we were the club where he spent his formative playing years."