The Weekend Sports Highlights with James Adderley
Good evening I’m James Adderly and this is Sports Monday.
It appears the PLB football National Completion had hit a rough spot as none of the advertised match was played over the weekend. It probably has something to do with the Belmopan Bandits protest which charged Verdes F.C. with the contravention of the PLB rules by exceeding the three player limit, fielding all of six foreigners, in the 6-1 loss over three weeks ago. There also might be other issues that has led to their unforeseen break and we have been made to understand that the upcoming schedule could suffer the same fate if some closure is not reached. We do hope cooler heads prevail and the season could be successfully concluded. Week five’s schedule looks like this Saturday 32st September at 7:30 PM Placencia Assassins play host to Wagiya inside the Michael Ashcroft while on Sunday Verdes FC Faces Police United at the Norman Broaster in a 4:00 PM start and at the MCC Grounds the Belize Defence Force battles Belmopan Bandits.
In the meantime we must give enough respect to Verdes FC who came back from a devastating loss at Queretaro of Mexico to edge San Francisco FC of Panama in an exciting 2-1 big W last Tuesday. From our viewpoint it’s an amazing comeback. Verdes now is in second place with four points, Queretaro leads with 7 and San Francisco is in third place. A win by Verdes on the 22nd October at Panama could five those seven points to finish tied in the three team group with the Mexican team. History will show that this performance by Verdes is the best in a CONCACAF Champions competition.
Turning to the karate scene the Cayo Shotokan Karate Club celebrated its twenty-fifth anniversary by hosting its seventh
Invitational International Karate Championship at the Falcon Field inside San Ignacio Town featuring forty-five athletes from Belize, El Salvador and Guatemala. Felicito Lopez of Belize had his moments in the Kumite Finals for seniors, flooring Alfredo Callejos of El Salvador. But he had no answer for the speed and foot accuracy of Callejos and the scoreboard indicates the dominance of the visiting athlete with the 10 to 1 result. Felicito Lopez takes silver. Meanwhile the battle for third found a Belizean in the hunt for bronze. Henry Friesen jumps to the early lead with the facial on Lionel Gonzalez. But Gonzalez rebounds with effective kicks to the body. Did I say effective kicks; well this one does get Friesen’s attention. The bronze goes to Lionel Gonzalez. In the Kumite Jr. Podrick Frazer of Belmopan got the better of Jose Teable of Salvador to earn top honors. The finals between these two were highly contested and the scoreboard record 4 to 2 in favor of the Belizean. Kaylan Dyke of San Ignacio took third place. In the under twenty, Cesar Dyke of Belize edged out Guatemalan Nerwin Garcia for the 10 – 6 gold medal win. Franz of Shotokan Karate Club earned the bronze. Folks the battle for the female Kumite title saw two Belizean Tracy Dyke and Dian Harrison and this display by Tracy Duke might have tipped the balance in favor as she snatches the gold forcing Dian Harrison into Silver. Angelia Zyden then got past Zydia Garcia for the bronze. In the last event Alejandro Aguilar of Guatemala was simply cheerful with his technical display and rightful captured the gold. However Belizean Cesar Dyke gave hi, a run for his money with this wonderful performance but the judges gave him silver. We say congratulations to the Cayo Shotokan Club as it continue to propel the sport to world class.
Finally we turn to the Orange walk finals football competition. Yesterday’s schedule opened with Guinea Grass facing Atlantic Bank. Baeza tries to give here the win in the remaining seconds; she beats 2 to launch this bullet that screams outside the target. So regulation finds a coreless stalemate. Folks after regulation and a round of penalty kicks we’re still tied in this one with on slot remaining. Guinea Grass send to goalkeeper Shaney Betancourt she gets it past Shania Melendez and Guinea Grass gets the W. The game II its Carmelita Young Stars facing Orange Strikers who should have opened the scoreboard with offering but she misses the target. Elvira Cruz then gets this shot from pointblank range and fails to get the job done. Cruz then tries making amend off this set piece but is denied by the keeper. Gisell Corella joins the crew who could get on the score but does not with this shot inside the goal mouth. So we go to second half and tables turn in favor of Carmelita Young Star. Esmeralda can get this nine foot and puts it home for one nil lead. Mercedes Chuc then steps up on this set piece and pins into the net for the Carmelita Stars 2 – zip big W.
