THE rural area All-daCosta team matched their Corporate Area counterparts by beating the Trinidad & Tobago All-Schools team, 3-1, at Brancourt, Clarendon yesterday, ensuring that the Jamaica/Trinidad Friendship Trophy remained in the island.
Carnell Learmond, the leading scorer in the daCosta Cup competition, found the back of the net twice, in the 55th and 64th minutes, while Draion McMain fired in the opener for the winners in the ninth minute.
Silas Spann scored for the visitors in the 18th minute of play.
It was almost deja vu for the Trinidadians, who lost by a similar margin to the All-Manning team on Tuesday as they conceded another early goal within 10 minutes of the game before erasing the deficit.
Similar to what happened in their first match, the Trinidadians went behind again via the penalty route due to yet another hand ball inside the area. The All-daCosta team's final goal came early in the second half.
Both teams were equal at the start and showed good technique until McMain was given space on top of the penalty box to shoot, for which the soca side was made to pay.
The visitors were not overly shocked by the goal and held their composure in the process. Such maturity paid off nine minutes later, when Spann fired a thunderbolt past goalkeeper Dwayne Kerr, after making a diagonal run inside the box.
Learmond, who had an excellent game, was by far the player-of-the-game as he hit the post from close range late in the first half, before blasting home his shot from the penalty spot on the resumption.
The second half was the Learmond show as he took on the task of leading from the front, with national technical director Wendell Downswell watching from the touchline.
The Glenmuir striker was denied after several individual surges on the Trinidadian goal, finally worked his way atop the 18-yard box and unleashed a rocket into the far corner of the goal.
There were plenty of substitutions by this, but this time around the visitors played with a little more heart and could have scored in the process, as they created a few scoring chances themselves.
However, the individual brilliance of the rural boys were too much for the all-stars - whose high school tournament is still far from ending in the twin-island republic - to contain.
"We didn't have much time to prepare; it was a short period for us because our competition is still in progress while yours is finished already," Selris Figaro, coach of the Trinidadian team, told the Observer.
"To a lesser extent we played a little better than in the first game, but the Jamaicans were a lot more hungrier; they wanted it more."
Coach of the All-DaCosta team, Carl Palmer, said had there been more time to prepare the team, they would have played an even better game than what was on display yesterday.
"The performance was not bad, but if we had a little bit more time, we would have given a better showing today," said Palmer.
"If you realise, there weren't a lot of technical or tactical decisions... but the players got together quickly and with better preparation, we could have performed more adequately."
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