Group one of the ISSA/Digicel Manning Cup quarter-final round began with a bang on Wednesday, with Wolmer’s Boys’ scoring a dramatic 3-2 win over Camperdown High in the feature game inside National Stadium.

After a one-sided game in the Group Two opening encounter where St Andrew Technical strode to a comfortable 4-0 win over Excelsior High, the fans were treated to a much different experience in the second game.

Imperious up to this point in the Manning Cup, Camperdown began the contest by bossing the game for much of the opening period, only to be stung twice midway the half. Ronaldo Webster in the 21st minute and Revaldo Mitchell four minutes later delivered two body blows to the team from east Kingston, as they went in trailing at the half for the first time in the Manning Cup this season.

Whatever was said at the half-time break by Coach Christopher Bender seemed to work, as Camperdown halved the deficit 15 minutes after the restart through their talisman Shaqueil Bradford and were level when Tivelle Edwards thumped one home just three minutes later in the 63rd minute.

With the momentum strongly in their favour, smart money was on Camperdown to go on and win the contest, but it was the Wolmer’s Warriors who would claim all three points.

An overbalanced Camperdown defence was caught out at the back stick by a composed Mitchell, who stroked home the winner in the 78th minute to give his team the advantage in the hunt for a spot in the semi-finals.

Winning Coach Alex Thomas thought his team made it harder for themselves than it needed to be.

“We should have put away the game earlier,” he quipped. “Praises to the Camperdown team — they came back, they fought, they pushed us on the back foot, but I praise my team also. We stayed focused, we stayed calm, and we got the victory.”

And the endeavour shown by his boys on Wednesday night came as no shock.

“This team has been doing it all season — coming back from being down, equalising and managing games well,” Thomas said.

He also had high praises for his double goalscorer Revaldo Mitchell, who has been the fulcrum of the Wolmer’s attack since the start of the season.

“[He is a] talented player; he is the one that the team relies on a lot and we have to keep him focused. It’s a journey and he is the one that carrying the team — hats off to him,” said a delighted Thomas.

With Kingston College and Charlie Smith on the horizon, Thomas will not be resting on his laurels but refocusing for the next big challenge against the defending champions next week.

“Two more big games, we plan for them. We will go back to the drawing board, get the team back up and be ready for the next game,” he said.

Meanwhile, the man of the hour, Mitchell was happy to be the one to come up with the goods for his team on the day.

“I am truly happy about the performance, I am truly happy that we got the win, because Camperdown was pushing at us in the last and we just played team football to get back at them,” he noted.

Camperdown Team Manager Donovan Lofters was upbeat despite the result, rating highly the mental fortitude shown by his boys.

“We won the mental battle because not many teams can come from 2-nil down against a quality team like Wolmer’s; and we could have won the game or drawn the game if we had made a defensive shape, but we went for the win.

“So it’s a mental victory for us. It was our first time going down this season and not many teams could have handled that the way we did, and it showed some character from the guys and we are proud of that. We need six points to go to the semi-finals and that’s the aim,” he stated.

Wolmer’s will play Kingston College in their next quarter-final game, while Camperdown will face Charlie Smith High.