High Expectations At Ochi
(The Ochi High Team of last season. They expect to be better this year.)
This is the final in a four-part preview series by The North Coast Times on the daCosta Cup for teams from the northeastern parishes of St Ann, St Mary, and Portland.
In the first part of the series, we identified Zone C as the Zone of Death, which includes six teams from St Ann and two from neighbouring Trelawny. The Zone brings together four teams that went through to the Inter-Zone round last year. However, only two of the teams will advance this time around.
One of those teams from Trelawny is William Knibb. The team from Hague went deep into the competition last year, reaching the quarter-finals of the D’Cup and of the Ben Francis Cup.
(Dwight Jeremiah of William Knibb is taking nothing for granted)
Team coach is Dwight Jeremiah. Mr Jeremiah told the North Coast Times that his team lost six members of the regular squad from last year. He said the team was in transition. He said the team was an all-around one and did not have any outright single person such as striker Mark Lewis from last year.
Mr Jeremiah said that although many people and supporters of the school take it for granted they will always get out of the preliminary round, he took nothing for granted. Their first match on Tuesday is against Brown’s Town at Adsison Park and then on Friday, Fencourt, also away. He says they would hope to get those points on the road and take it from there.
For Ocho Rios High it’s a different scenario from that of William Knibb, or fellow St Ann teams York Castle and Brown’s Town that advanced last year to the Inter-Zone. The school has a strong football culture. Head of the Physical Education/Sports department and manager of the team is Eyan Keane. Coach Veron Peterkin says the team is rebuilding after narrowly missing out on getting into the Inter-Zone round last season. Team captain is Tajay McIntosh.
Mr Peterkin says they had a solid pre-season and the team is evenly balanced. That pre-season included a thumping by Jamaica College 6-0 but he said he was not perturbed They were featured in the first part ed by that. was not They had much better results against Petersfield of Westmoreland and Central High, the latter with whom they drew twice home and away. Their first match is against newcomers Discovery Bay.
Brown’s Town are another team to watch. They were runners-up to York Castle last season and were put out of the competition by Dinthill. They were featured in the first part of this series. Go to our website for the previews also on St Mary and Portland teams.
