Rampant Mona whip Innswood 5-1

Mona High got their first real taste of on-field action in this year’s ISSA Manning Cup following a relatively easy 5-1 win over Innswood High in their Zone E encounter at Chedwin Park on Friday.

The Craig Butler-coached side took some time to settle on the uneven Chedwin Park surface, and it took 22 minutes to find the opener which was scored following a long-range effort by Romarion Thomas and which lobbed goalkeeper Gary Heslop.

Robino Gordon got the first of his two goals in the 37th minute following his brilliant turn and volley which impressed the sparse crowd on hand to see one of the teams to beat in this season’s competition.

Innswood made it interesting early in the second half as Kyontae Grandison headed home a corner to make it 2-1.

Following a quick switch with Dante Peralto reverting to his starting position at centre half, Mona sealed things at the back, which allowed them to press more, and they were rewarded with three more goals with Gordon scoring in the 75th minute, which was followed by strikes from Kishaine Gordon in the 77th minute and substitute Javier Dunn two minutes from regular time.

The win, which was Mona’s second of the early campaign, was pleasing to Butler who continues to fine-tune his squad, which he says is bigger than last year.

“We took a while to get going because we have a lot of systems that we play and we are feeling out which one will be better. We have a deep bench this year and a team is as strong as its bench. I am very excited about that because we have more people this year,” Butler said.