KINGSTON, Jamaica — Jose Marti became the first team to hold reigning ISSA/Digicel Manning Cup champions Kingston College (KC) scoreless this season when they played out a 0-0 draw at the Royal Lakes Field in the first leg of their round of 16 tie on Wednesday.

Despite being the 16th seed playing against the number one seed, there was no real appearance of a mismatch as Jose Marti played to their strengths in an effort to blunt the KC attack, which they eventually managed to do.

Their head coach Patrick Lewis, who showed no fear of the champions, was not at all surprised by the result.

“Defending champion or not, we are here to play football and that’s what we did today (Wednesday). The guys are up to the task as always because we have trained for this, and we are well trained,” he declared.

Lewis thought his boys did an almost perfect job against the boys from North Street.

“The only thing I didn’t get was the goal, but overall, I think they put on a good performance.”

The return leg will be played on the much bigger Stadium East Field on Saturday, but this does not perturb Lewis who believes his boys will be able to match their opponents stride for stride.

“I don’t think their fitness level is superior to ours so…I guess we will see on the day,” he remarked.

And as far as pulling off what would certainly be deemed the shock of the season in ousting the champions, Lewis was backing his team to do just that.

“We are always optimistic, and the ball is round, so we are keeping our fingers crossed,” he said.

But while Lewis was singing the praises of his team, KC head coach Raymond Watson thought it was his boys who failed to perform which resulted in the goalless draw.

“I thought we came here thinking that we got three points already and someone gave us three goals. I don’t think we came mentally prepared.

“Our approach was lackluster and even though we created a lot of chances, kudos to the opponents, they did what they had to do to escape with a draw,” Watson said.

“They were basically working for that, and they achieved their objective. We were trying to win the game and they were trying to defend, but we created chances…but I think we will get it right on Saturday.”

Just as he predicted after the loss in the derby to St George’s College a few weeks ago, Watson assured that there would be a KC response against Jose Marti.

“The result on Saturday will be different. A bigger pitch, a much better playing surface and the antics of these guys won’t work at Stadium East,” he promised.

KC and Jose Marti will meet in the feature game of a doubleheader at the Stadium East Field, starting at 3:15pm.

———- Forwarded message ———

From: Dwayne Richards

Date: Fri, Oct 28, 2022 at 10:11 AM

Subject: Jose Marti hoping to pull off KC shocker in Manning Cup

To:

Photo 945: Jose Marti coach Patrick Lewis – “The only thing I didn’t get was the goal, but overall, I think they put on a good performance.”

Photo 949: Kingston College coach Raymond Watson – “The result on Saturday will be different. A bigger pitch, a much better playing surface and the antics of these guys won’t work at Stadium East.”