CHAMPIONS Barbican virtually secured their place in the Sherwin Williams Women's Premier League final yesterday after beating UWI Women, 5-0, in a first-leg semi-final at the UWI Bowl.

However, Waterhouse will take a one-goal advantage into their semi-final against Portmore Strikers after an exciting 4-3 win.

In the opening game, Barbican, led by a hat-trick from Kenesha Reid and a brace from the league's leading scorer Jody Ann McGregor, made light work of the first-time semi-finalists.

Reid opened the scoring after only two minutes and added a second in the 11th to knock the wind out of their opponents. However, UWI held on until the 66th when McGregor netted her first and Barbican's third.

In the second minute of added time, Reid completed her hat-trick and McGregor added another a minute later to seal the home team's fate.

Barbican's captain, Alicia James, said her team played their natural game and came through in the end. But although they are five goals ahead, she said they do not intend to take their opponents lightly.

"We need to stay focused and try get some more goals and work on things we will need for the final," she said.

UWI's coach, Dwayne Richards, said his team started slowly and just could not lift their game to get back.

"I never expected such a heavy defeat but we got caught cold because they scored in the second minute and got another right after that and we never recovered," he said.

Meanwhile, the feature game between Waterhouse and Portmore lived up to expectations with Waterhouse coming out on top after falling behind.

Rochelle Bryan fired Portmore in front in the 11th, but Tasheka Small restored parity for Waterhouse six minutes later.

Waterhouse then netted three unanswered goals, with strikes from Davia Morrison (35th), Kerona Williams (42nd) and Omolyn Davis (45th), to take a 4-1 lead at the break.

After the interval, Nicole Broderick had two great chances to add to Waterhouse's lead, but failed to capitalise.

Portmore then pulled a goal back through Tashana Vincent's in the 63rd, and Venecia Reid cut the deficit to one when she netted from close range in the 80th.

They also came close to grabbing the equaliser, but Waterhouse held on for the win.

"After going down we did some good things and managed to score four goals, but we should have played a bit smarter in the latter stages of the game," he said.

Portmore's coach Cornell Clarke said his team conceded a few unfortunate goals but they are a better side and can overturn the tie.

"We went behind by two unfortunate deflections... but we ended the game on a high and could have equalised and won... We are better than them, we just have to keep it together," he said.