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Eltham earn three points without kicking a ball

Published:Tuesday | September 12, 2023 | 12:10 AMOrane Buchanan/Staff Reporter
Members of the Denham Town High Manning Cup team at the Edward Seaga Sports Complex in Kingston yesterday after their match against Eltham High was called off. The game was cancelled after hosts Denham Town failed to present a printed copy of their match c
Kenyon Hemans
Members of the Denham Town High Manning Cup team at the Edward Seaga Sports Complex in Kingston yesterday after their match against Eltham High was called off. The game was cancelled after hosts Denham Town failed to present a printed copy of their match card.

ELTHAM High were rewarded with a 3-0 victory and three points without kicking a ball in their opening Group C Manning Cup fixture against home team Denham Town High at the Edward Seaga Sports Complex yesterday after the hosts failed to produce an official match card.

Marvin Tate, head coach of Denham Town, said he encountered problems downloading and printing the required documents in order to play their fixture.

“ISSA (Inter-Secondary Schools Sports Association) has introduced a new process and we weren’t able to present the match card at the specified time. It was sent to my phone but the referees said that they couldn’t honour it because they needed a printed copy,” Tate said.

Coach Tate added that it has been somewhat of a rocky road for the Denham Town team leading up to this point, but he believes his boys are used to hardships and will bounce back.

“We are disappointed but we’ve been having that all season. It hasn’t been a smooth road for us as a team. We didn’t even have a field to train on and we started on the asphalt at the school back in July. These are tough young men and they understand what hardship is and I’m sure they’ll recover from this.”

Ewan Scott, competitions coordinator at ISSA, said clear instructions were handed out to deal with situations such as this and teams were aware that written match cards will not be accepted by the referees on match day.

“The process shouldn’t be difficult, as we’ve sent out instructions to the coaches and the teams while asking them prior to the season to check and ensure that they can generate their match cards, because no written cards will be accepted on match days,” Scott said.

Gregory Allen, head coach of Eltham, said he was disappointed that their opening game was not played.

“We haven’t played Manning Cup football since 2019, so I’m pretty sure that my players were eager to go. We just have to motivate our players, as we have to get back to the training ground for a game on Thursday,” Allen said.

At Royal Lakes yesterday, Jahwan Payne and Joshua Dewar scored hat-tricks as Haile Selassie whipped Greater Portmore 10-0. The other goals came from Phillip Hudson (2) and Jermaine McDonald.

orane.buchanan@gleanerjm.com

Today’s matches

Calabar High vs Penwood (Calabar)

Hydel High vs Kingston College (Royal Lakes)

Spanish Town High vs Meadowbrook High (Spanish Town Prison Oval)

Cumberland High vs Kingston Technical (Cumberland)

Clan Carthy High vs Excelsior (Alpha Academy)

Cedar Grove Academy vs Tarrant (Cedar Grove)

Bridgeport High vs St Andrew Technical (Dunbeholden)

Edith Dalton James High vs St Mary’s College (Edith Dalton James)

Norman Manley High vs Mona High (Maxfield Park)

St Catherine High vs Innswood High (St Catherine)

Papine High vs St Jago High (Papine)

Wolmer’s Boys vs Donald Quarrie High (Mico)

Note: Match venues in brackets

All matches kick off at 3:30 p.m.