Cavalier now ready for title defence, says Speid
CAVALIER FC have not had the most impressive of starts to the defence of the Jamaica Premier League title they won in 2021, but their Technical Director Rudolph Speid has never really been perturbed.
Now, as it gets nearer to the business end of the season, he is convinced that they are perfectly positioned to retain their title.
At the end of the first round of the season, Cavalier had just as many losses as they had wins, but they have gone about changing the win/loss ratio since then to positive effect.
Their latest win on Monday night, a 2-0 blanking of Harbour View, was their 8th in 2022 and has Speid convinced that his team is ready!
“I was struggling to put the right set of players in this formation, [but] I think I have gotten it right now,” he declared after the win at the Anthony Spalding Sports Complex on Monday night.
“We have the right set of players. They know their duties that they are supposed to do, but if you just come back to last year when it came down to the business end, we got it together. And that’s what we are about, building the team for the business end,” he reasoned.
While they have occupied the final play-off position for much of the campaign, Speid knew what his challenges were and believes that the champions are now set to go all the way again.
“The problem was the personnel in the positions, so that is what we have sorted out admirably now and we think we are able to cause a lot of problems to different teams,” he stated.
Speid has done the math and knows exactly what it will take to win the title this season, compared to the last campaign.
“Last year, because we came second (in the regular season), we only had to win three games to win the title, this year we are preparing ourselves to win five,” he declared.
With the win over Harbour View on Monday, 5th place Cavalier have now cut the gap to just two points behind 4th place Mount Pleasant, who were beaten 3-1 at home by league leaders Dunbeholden FC.