North Village 1 –Devonshire Cougars 0

A tame goal by Pierre Smith after 67 minutes was sufficient to lead Village to victory in this undistinguished Friendship Trophy contest against Cougars at Lord's yesterday.

At the time of the goal the only likely result in regulation time would be a scoreless draw but fortunately for the fans of both teams they would be spared the agony of watching two out-of-touch sides continue to toil in extra-time after such a long period of surprisingly dull football.

Smith's goal came from a throw in from the right by skipper Sammy Degraff and after Cougars were unable to make a clearance it left Smith in position to tap the ball home from close range.

To be honest neither side deserved to win with each having just one shot on goal in the opening half and chances being few and far in between for each attack in the second half.

The opening half never came close to rising above the mediocre with defences soaking up any pressure either team were able to muster outside of the penalty box.

Play was so uninspiring, with attacks always petering out outside of the box, the entire first half saw the first real chance coming after 31 minutes when Korvon Tucker of Cougars had his grounder from 16 yards saved by a falling Jason Williams in the Village goal.

Village's first attack was to follow two minutes later when Jason Lee's effort from 16-yards sailed a few feet over the post.

Aside from these attacks the defences dominated with Kofi Dill solid at centre-back for Village and Zekiro White and Ijahmon Mallory holding things together in the middle for Cougars.

Everybody obviously hoped that play would improve after the re-start and Village were first to get into a goalscoring position when Smith was in position to gather a fine header in his direction by Ralph Bean after 50 minutes. However, Smith fired over from 16 yards much to the dismay of his bench.

Afrer the quiet go-ahead goal by Smith play still continued to drift along without any sort of explosiveness which had to worry both benches about the inability of their players to inject more life and ideas into their play.

Korvon Tucker shot meekly at goalkeeper Williams after 73 minutes in Cougars' first attack in the second half while Village hinted they could take a decisive edge with the appearance of young teenager Terryn Fray adding a much needed fighting spirit up front.

Coach Shaun Goater was to come on as a substitute for Village after 82 minutes but Cougars still were able to match their opponents and looked capable of getting an equaliser. However the most they could do during counter attacks was to force Village's defence to make a few desperation clearances just in front of goal with three minutes left.

North Village: J.Williams; J.Sousa, R.Wilson, K.Dill, D.Tankard; J.Lee, S.DeGraff, J.Briers (S.Goater, 82 min); P.Smith, R.Bean, V.Tankard (T.Fray, 64 min). Subs not used: M.Swan, Z.Hendrickson.

Goals: P.Smith, 67

Devonshire Cougars: R.Brangman, J.Butterfield, Zekiro White, I.Mallory (L.Simmons, 78 min), Zeko White; M.Smith (K.Goddard, 74 min), T.Steede, M.Steede; K.Tucker (T.Smith, 78 min), K.Steede, J.Seymour. Subs not used: D.Cox, D.Simons, L.Brangman, M.Doucet.

Referee: G.O'Brien

Man of the match: K.Dill (Village).