Island Soccer League (ISL) defending champions Storm kept the nucleus of their championship winning side when the league released the names of those players protected from the draft by their respective team yesterday.

With the ISL season fast approaching, coaches were put on the spot during the past week, deciding which players from last year's rosters would be protected and who wouldl be thrown back into the draft which is to be held on April 30.

There is a slight adjustment in this year's draft procedure with eight players instead of five allowed to be protected by their respective clubs.

"We bumped it up to eight this year. Last year it was five due to the fact that everyone had tried out the year before and a lot of players didn't know about the league, so it was a chance to get everyone integrated," said ISL president David Bascome.

"Now that the awareness is out there in regards to the league, we added three players to be protected.

"This means that teams will be allowed to pick seven players out of the draft.

"Try-outs started on Monday (yesterday) for some teams and run right through the week so each coach will get a few chances to run their eye over players they may like or don't know."

Storm coach Andrew Bascome chose to keep Ajani Gibbons, Angelo Simmons and Keemo Bean, members of Boulevard's FA Cup winning side along with OJ Minors, Kevin Lambe, Corey Dowling, Shaun Simmons and Ernest Signor as they look to lift successive titles.

With try-outs for all teams throughout this week, it remains to be seen how the sides will look when the draft is completed.

Losing out on the title defence will be Antwan Russell, who has been picked up by Bermuda Hogges this year, thus making him unavailable for ISL duty.

Last year's worst team, Arsenal, will keep hold of the first pick in last year's draft, Cecoy Robinson, along with Ijahmon Mallory, Dwiya Blyden and Reggie Lowe among those being kept.

The Union, last year's runners-up to the Storm, will be built around Rohaan Simons, Kamen Tucker, Jahnai Raynor and Dennis Russell who are among the eight held by coach Stanton Lewis.

Darren Dowling, Kyle Jones, Conneko Trott, Takeyhi Walker and Mark Steede will form the backbone of Titans, while Adrian Burrows, Jameiko Jennings, Jelani Butterfield will lead the Royal into the new season.

The Kings have kept PHC duo Chris Furbert, Aquino Grant while Jahni Bean, Dion Stovell and Cud-Joe Matthews have also been retained.

Kaiwon Dill, Heys Wolffe, Kori Goddard and David Signor have been held by Apex while Coolridge Durham, Kaiya Darrell, Vincent Minors Jr. and Ricky Tucker have been kept by Knights coach Keishon Smith.

List of protected players

– see Scoreboard, Page 24