(Duke) Simons, for tonight's crucial clash against North Village at St.John's Field.

Town's leading goalscorer with seven so far this season, Simons was sent off by referee George O'Brien during last Sunday's FA Cup third round victory over St. George's All-Stars at Wellington Oval and will automatically sit out tonight's fixture.

With first place at stake this weekend -- defending champions Vasco and Village only trail Town by one point -- Town will be banking on a capable replacement for Simons to fill the void.

New player McLee Smith, who joined Town from PHC Zebras, could be the man who coach Mark Trott will count on to replace his ace goalscorer, along with Woldi Place.

Smith struck twice in Town's resounding 7-0 triumph last Sunday and his speed has worried many defences in previous matches when he has been used coming off the bench.

Coach Kenny Thompson, meanwhile, will want Village to show a marked improvement on their 4-0 win over Commercial League side Belco last week -- a game in which they were only able to take full command during the second half after their upstart opponents restricted them to a 1-0 lead at the interval.

Despite the loss of top scorer Simons, Town are expected to have a slight edge over Village, who have problems of their own up front.

Tomorrow's First Division action sees three matches taking place, the feature game being at Somerset where the Trojans will try to make it two victories in a row by getting past Southampton Rangers.

Rangers suffered an embarrassing 3-2 loss against Second Division Social Club in the FA Cup last week and it remains to be seen if they can recover from that setback.

Trojans, meanwhile, defeated Hamilton Parish 1-0 in a hard earned victory in extra-time at Wellington Oval. It wasn't pretty but coach Andrew Bascombe will be hoping it was the result to get his side back on track.

In other games champions Vasco are favoured over Boulevard at Lord's while the Hamilton Parish-Devonshire Cougars match has all the makings of a stalemate.

DARRON SIMONS -- suspended for tonight's crunch league clash.