PHOENIX UFO Toyota Firehouse’s heat was just too hot for Nu Look 360 Connection when the LIME Pelican Football Challenge resumed at Kensington Oval Sunday night after a one-week break.
Firehouse burnt Nu Look 360 Connection 3-0 with goals from Llewellyn Broomes (32nd minute), Kemar Bartlett (57th) and Paul “Soup” Lovell (84th).
In the preceding match, Akademiks earned a hard-fought 1-0 victory over Emmerson Boyce 5th Avenue Bajan Elite, courtesy Arantees Lawrence’s 43rd-minute strike, to move to maximum six points from two wins.
And in the first game of the triple-header, midfielder Dwayne “Boot” Griffith scored in the 26th minute to give Broad Street Men and Women Red Tridents a 1-0 victory over defending champions Tiger Malt Bajan Pride.
Playing on a wet outfield, with a muddy middle area by the cricket pitches after heavy evening rain, Firehouse were spearheaded by a superb display from former Barbados captain Norman Forde and Lovell.
Another player who caught the eye was midfielder Bartlett, who plays for Parish Land in the Barbados Football Association’s Division One competition.
Bartlett scored the goal of the night, picking up the ball just past the halfway line and hammering a powerful left-foot shot into the roof of the nets, after dribbling past two defenders, to make it 2-0.
Broomes had opened the scoring for Firehouse in the 32nd minute when he squeezed the ball over the line with a low left-foot shot after a melee in the 360 Connection defence following a corner by Forde.
Forde also had his firm free kick tipped over the crossbar by goalkeeper Kerry Holder. At the other end, a long-range shot by 360 Connection’s midfielder Malcolm “Buju” Marshall hit the crossbar but Dwayne Stanford’s shot from the rebound was off-target.
Stanford was also unlucky to hit the right upright with a left-foot shot after beating goalkeeper Saheka “Rossi” Duke following a lovely combination play with Marshall and veteran Anthony Cumberbatch, who rolled back the years with some nifty moves, which were unrewarded.
Lovell, who had a goal from a powerful header disallowed for off-side after Forde floated the ball from a free kick over the 360 Connection’s defence, climaxed the game with a gem.
Substitute Troy Callender crossed the ball into the six-yard box and the advancing Lovell wrong-footed his former Silver Sands’ teammate Kevin Padmore before back-flicking the ball with his trailing leg into the nets.
In the preceding game, Akademiks earned their second consecutive victory when Mario Harte, after having his shot blocked by Bajan Elite’s goalkeeper Jason Boxill, followed through and squared the ball from the byline to Lawrence, who only had to touch it over the goal line.
In the night’s first game, Red Tridents, without the injured Rommel Burgess and Kadeem Atkins, rebounded from their 1-4 first-match thrashing by Top Bay Settlers to upstage the inaugural winners when Griffith collected a through ball from Jesse Turton and scored.
