Benfica hold unlucky Waterhouse

Carl Gilchrist, Gleaner Writer

St Ann's Benfica, seeking to rebound from a five-goal thrashing by Tivoli Gardens the previous week, battled to a 0-0 draw with beaten first end-of-round finalists, Waterhouse, in their Digicel Premier League encounter at Drax Hall on Sunday.

With both teams taking a while to settle, the first half was evenly contested, though both teams had little to cheer about. The action picked up in the second with Benfica, spurred on by the home crowd, initially starting to pressure the Waterhouse defence, but they were kept at bay by some stern defending.

The visitors eventually settled and their first real dangerous move came in the 65th minute. A build-up on the right gave Weston Forrest a clear shot on goal, but his grounder was blocked by the Benfica custodian.

Waterhouse again attacked and came close to scoring when a torrid shot by Forrest hit the crossbar and rebounded into play.

Tactical game

The action swung from end to end with the Drewsland team making several attacks, but Benfica defended well, while adopting a counter-attacking strategy.

"It was a good, tactical game," said Benfica's coach, Vonnie Clarke. "Waterhouse played well. I thought we had some opportunities that we could have taken. They did well on the offence, we did well defensively. At the end of the day, it was a fair result. Coming from what happened at Tivoli, I thought we rebounded nicely today and the players showed character. This is what we've been asking for.

Waterhouse's coach, Baris Johnson, said: "It was a very good performance by the team. We came here for the three points and I think the guys did well in terms of our system of play. It was unfortunate we didn't get one in the net, hitting the post two times, I think we were a little bit unlucky today."

"The players, I must give them credit, they wanted to come out and give of their best and we played a very good game today," Johnson added