MAY PEN, Clarendon — Ten-man Humble Lion blew away Sporting Central Academy 3-0 with an impressive display of ‘total football’ in Sunday night’s Claro/Clarendon KO final at Effortville to become the competition’s most successful team.

Dreadlocked striker Denzil Watson atoned for earlier misses when he sneaked in at the back post to tap home the opener in the 24th minute.

Roberto Fletcher then struck from close range to give the hosts a healthy cushion at the half, but was later red-carded for violent conduct.

The visitors, however, failed to make their numerical advantage count and slipped further behind when Tyrone Sawyers sealed the issue with a point-blank header late on.

The result means Humble Lion were beating Sporting for the first time since gaining Premier League status last year, and it took them eight games to do so.

The handsome victory came in front of an estimated 3,500 spectators coming in the heights of the Yuletide season and directly on the heels of three successive Premier League wins, which installed them as the parish’s top KO team with five trophies and a $75,000 winners’ purse.

For coach Lenworth Hyde Snr, it was also a personal milestone as he has kept his record of winning a trophy at every club he has coached.

He was humbled by the achievements. “We are really happy for this win because you have to become the top team in your parish if you want to be a top club (in the country),” Hyde said.

It was the first time that an official football match was being played under lights in Clarendon, and both teams took to the the field looking to outshine each other from the first whistle.

But, perhaps fittingly, it was the homesters who shrugged off three early misses to light up the park with an opening goal that evoked load roars from their animated fans.

Right-back Ajuran Brown whipped in a deft free-kick beyond the defence from the short corner position for the lurking Watson to poke in and bring the game alive.

Humble Lion went further ahead two minutes from the break when a neat one-two combination play involving Watson and Peter Brown sent Fletcher clear through on goal and the former Waterhouse striker kept his cool to fire into the lower right hand corner of the frame.

Sporting, who pocketed $50,000, left a number of first-team regulars out of the contest and never quite got into their rhythm of slick forward passes as the two early goals had them chasing the game by any means necessary.

And if missing three sitters mid-way the second-half summed up their luck, then conceding a third goal, when an unmarked Sawyers nodded in Phillip Peddie’s corner with eight minutes to go, all but put them to sleep on a cool night.

Meanwhile, in the curtain raiser, Super League outfit Monymusk rallied for a 3-1 thumping of York Town in the third-placed decider to cop $40,000 and qualify for their second consecutive All-Island KO championship.