By Paul A. Reid, Staff ReporterWESTERN BUREAU:
RICARDO HOWELL scored a hat-trick to lead Clarks Town to an emphatic 6-0 thrashing of Preston FC in the Trelawny Football Association's National Rums of Jamaica Top League Mid-Season final at the Elliston Wakeland Community Centre yesterday.
Howell's opening goal in the 13th minute gave the Leroy Gardener-coached team the lead at half-time and he returned to score twice in the second half, netting in the 56th and 72nd minutes. A bizarre own-goal in the 69th and goals from Marvin Shan (83rd) and Yuhan Grant (88th) rounded off the scoring.
Howell took over the lead in the goal-scoring race as he is on nine, three more than Nicholas Dixon of Kinloss.
BIZARRE GOAL
The own-goal was one of the more interesting seen in a long time and appeared to break the spirit of the Preston team that trailed 2-0 at the time. In his attempt to clear a shot that had rebounded off the base of the right upright, Defender Don Parson managed only to hit the ball straight up into the air. Goalkeeper Clayton Ennis, apparently thinking the ball had gone out of play, took his eyes off it and swung unto the crossbar, only to see the ball come back directly inside the six yard box and bounce into the top of the goal.
A confident Gardener told The Gleaner afterwards he expected to dominate the game and it was only a matter of taking their chances.
"We played them in the first round and got a 3-1 victory and could have scored more as we created a lot of chances. Basically, my team is technically better than all the other teams in the competition and I expect us to cruise through."
Gardener said that at half-time he told his team to settle down and take the chances they were creating and the rest would have been easy.
Clarks Town lead the league with 16 points from seven games, two more than Preston on 14 points, while Kinloss are on 13.
Clarks Town dominated yesterday's game and the outcome was obvious from early, especially after Preston was forced into an early change - taking off midfielder Jermaine Earle due to an injury.
SECOND GOAL
Howell gave them the lead when he side-footed a ball from close range past Ennis. He missed no fewer than three more chances in the first half before adding a second 11 minutes into the second half, when he scored from close range beating Ennis at his near post.
The own-goal made it 3-0 before Howell completed his hat-trick with a long-range missile from 25 yards out.
Shan also scored from well outside the area, while Grant
finished off the scoring two
minutes before time when he slotted home after Dwayne Brown had wormed his way through the now dejected Preston defence.
The competition resumes at 3:00 p.m. this afternoon with two matches, hosting South Trelawny and Duanvale travelling to play homesters Kinloss.
