Ten-man Waterhouse FC greeted new coach Glendon “Admiral” Bailey with another defeat in their Red Stripe Premier League (RSPL) campaign on Sunday.

This was not just because of a lack of effort on their part that they went down 1-2 to fellow cellar dwellers Boys’ Town at Drewsland. It was the act of committing two blatant rudimentary defensive errors at the back that an alert Boys’ Town attack took advantage of.

Trevin Garnett in the 13th minute and Andrew Allen in the 75th minute scored for Boys’ Town, while Andre McFarlane replied in minute 36 for Waterhouse.

Despite the defeat, Waterhouse remained in 11th position on the RSPL standing on 11 points, while Boys’ Town moved up to 10 points with the third win of their campaign, but remain rooted at the foot of the pack.

Bailey inherited a team with grave defensive weaknesses and this, Bailey said, he intends to get cracking on to correct with great immediacy.

“As you can see we have a good crop of players but my immediate concern is with the defence. Once I get this area of worry tidied up we should be fine. The biggest challenge at present is probably to get the players to understand their roles. And as you would realise it is my first week in charge and it will take some time to put certain measures in place.

“It is the first game with me in charge and it opened my eyes to a number of things that I will have to remedy. Coming in, I knew it was a challenge, but I really wanted to have this first game under my belt. We have some injuries, but I am not going to make that as an excuse as we have players to come in and fill the gap. But coming in at the middle of the season to get the players to play my type of football will not happen overnight. We will be working at it and we will get it right very soon,” Bailey promised.

Andrew Price, his Boys’ Town counterpart, lauded the victory: “Good tonic for the team. We have not won in a while and we really wanted to go out there today and concentrate. Despite the fact that Waterhouse is where they are on this side of the table they are still a team with some quality.

“That made it imperative for us to approach the game with a type of mindset that this will not be a pushover engagement as we are going to play a good team and it will be a dogfight for the entire evening. In our efforts, we showed a lot of character against a tough opponent.

“One of the things I keep telling the team before each game is that we must find ways to win our games. The players responded fittingly today (Sunday) by putting in the work and as it turned out we emerged victorious,” Price said.

Full points were at a premium for both teams and they duly began aggressively in the hunt for the precious commodity of three points. However, within 13 minutes of the opening whistle, it was Waterhouse who fell behind to a defence-aided Trevin Garnett opening goal while kicking down the slope at the southern end of the ground. Taking the lead was golden for the Collie Smith Drive visitors being a tad more industrious than their hosts in the opening salvo.

Falling behind so early in a key second-round game shook the home team into remedial action with Andre McFarlane leading the way with his forward thrust and industry. It was therefore not surprising when the former Tivoli Gardens players brought the teams level nine minutes before the interval.

Playing a high-pressed game, McFarlane met with aplomb, a ball headed firmly into his path by top striker Jermaine Anderson and from a difficult angle inside the area, he blasted the ball past a helpless Boys’ Town goalkeeper Leon Goffe.

With everything still to play for, the teams returned for the second half with much grit and determination and Waterhouse showed much more urgency now kicking down the slope. However, nine minutes after the resumption both teams were reduced to 10 players as defenders Irvino English of Waterhouse and Wayne Ellis of Boys’ Town were given their marching orders for an early shower by the referee, Malica Reid.

Following the expulsion of the players, the game settled down to better order and once again, Boys’ Town always on the lookout for goalscoring opportunities caught the Waterhouse defence napping with a fast break. In a one on one situation goalkeeper Rushane Patterson was beaten for the second time in the match to give Boys’ Town their third win of the campaign.