Darrell the only bright point in drab draw
St. George's Colts 1Devonshire Cougars 1Clay Darrell's second half goal earned St George's a share of the spoils in a dour contest in the East End yesterday.After an opening half in which Colts rarely showed any scoring ability, Darrell pulled his team level when he raced after a high bouncing ball out of the defence and coolly lobbed it over the head of Cougars goalkeeper Ricardo Brangman just four minutes after the restart.His equaliser, after Cougars were put in the driver's seat on the strength of a first-half goal by Tumani Steede after 42 minutes the opener coming after Cougars had earned territorial advantage by pinning Colts down in their half for majority of the period.Though much of the play was uninspiring and the contest itself rather dull, things came alive near the end with either team looking capable of winning it.After 82 minutes Jameau Hayward blew a chance for the home side when he rose high to meet an Oronde Bascome free kick, but Hayward astonishingly directed his header straight into the arms of goalkeeper Brangman.Cougars, always looking more competent when they advanced into a goalscoring position followed this up with a glorious –effort by Kwame Steede after –86 minutes. But the Bermuda international midfielder's fine point-blank header was brilliantly saved by goalkeeper Hall with the rebound finally scrambled away by an under fire defence.All of the exchanges late in the game added fire to a match-up that saw both teams guilty of lacking ideas when within scoring range.The home side, clearly having less vision with Darrell mostly left with the task of doing damage alone, while Cougars were often a threat down the left flanks where speedy Domico Coddington kept the defence in disarray with some fine crosses after usually getting by left full-back Greg Wade.While it often looked like Cougars would be the inevitable winners if there was to be a winner, Colts needed to be praised for battling relentlessly even when things looked bleak for them at times when nothing was going right for them when they went forward into an attacking mode.And it should be noted that the visitors failed to take a deserved lead after 19 minutes when Freddy Hall dived to his right to save a poorly hit penalty by Moses Steede.St. George's: F Hall G Wade, N Paynter (J Warren, 67), E Signor, D Signor; O Bascome, J Hayward, C Simmons, M Anderson (J Carlington, 45), M Crane (W Jones, 45), C Darrell. Subs not used: C Hill, M Paynter, Jer Hayward, J Darrell. Booked M Anderson, D Signor, C Simmons.Goal: Darrell 49Devonshire Cougars: R Brangman J Butterfield, K Franks, D Cox, K Tucker, M Steede (M Smith, 74), K Steede, C Caisey, J Smith (S Pearman, 77), T Steede, D Coddington. Subs not used: Z.White. Booked K Steede, M Steede.Goal: T Steede 42Referee: R Cann.Man of the match: K Steede (Cougars).
