Hood and St George’s in fight for survival
Robin Hood coach Kyle Lightbourne remains hopeful of his side retaining their Digicel Premier Division status, but admits their fortunes aren’t in their hands.Hood lock horns with fellow relegation threatened side St George’s with tomorrow’s night match Goose Gosling Field a six-pointer for both sides.As the table stands, Hood are rooted at the bottom on 11 points, while St George’s are on 12 points. Flanagan’s Onions have 17 points but can still be caught by one of the teams below them ... but not both.The original tie between Hood and St George’s was postponed due to a flooded pitch at BAA Field on March 3. That game in hand has given the two teams renewed hopes for survival, though Lightbourne virtually conceded that Hood’s last hopes of survival had vanished. His former club, PHC, threw a welcomed lifeline to Hood by thrashing Onions 9-0 last weekend, a scoreline that means that Hood now have a better goal difference than Onions.“We have to win our remaining games and see what happens with the rest of the sides,” said Lightbourne. “We still have to play St George’s and both sides know that it is a must win match come Thursday night so we will be prepared to fight for that as we did against Wolves.“There is still everything to play for in regards to ourselves and our quest for survival so we have to be prepared and ready to play. They (St George’s) have had a good set of results recently so they will be looking to get the points that will see them stay in with a chance heading into the final weekend.“But you have to be realistic in this situation, and the reality is that if Onions win their final game they are safe, and maybe a point helps them depending our what we do, but it could also be over if we draw on Thursday. We have been getting points here and there but the inconsistency of the team stems from a lot of players leaving last year and a few players not playing this season for various reasons.”On the final day of the league campaign this weekend Onions travel to White Hill to face off against the Trojans, while St George’s host PHC at Wellington Oval and Hood welcome North Village to Goose Gosling Field and should be encouraged by the fact that they recently beat the Rams in the FA Cup at Bernard Park.Onions have the worst goal difference of the three bottom teams (-22), while St George’s are -14 and Hood -19, an advantage for Hood who can only escape the drop on goal difference.The scenarios, however, will be null and void if the result of tomorrow’s match is a draw, a result that would relegate both teams. Another scenario sees Onions winning their match against Somerset, or getting a point, which would relegate Hood even if they won tomorrow night. A draw for Onions on Sunday would take them to 18 points which is the maximum St George’s can get by winning their last two matches, though the east enders would survive on goal difference.For Lightbourne, it has been an interesting season of ups and downs, with player unavailability leading to his sides current situation.“It’s when you don’t have the same players every week to form some sort of basis of a team you can work with, but we are still in with a shout so we will try and make the most of it,” he said.“It comes down to who wants it the most on the night and we need to make sure we are ready and up for the challenge.“This has been interesting for me because I’m used to being at the other end of the table fighting for silverware but this is a great chance for us as club to do something that I haven’t seen done in my time, and that’s claw back this big deficit in this fashion.”
