Cooreville take heart from Major League quarterfinal first leg
COOREVILLE GARDENS head coach Calvert Fitzgerald is confident his team can earn promotion to the Championship division following their five-goal thriller against Police National in the first leg of the Kingston and St Andrew Football Association (KSAFA) Wray & Nephew-sponsored Major League quarterfinals on Sunday.
Cooreville Gardens defeated Police National 3-2 at home to take the lead in the two-legged tie. Fitzgerald is confident his team can get the better of Police National and believes they have the ability to earn promotion to the KSAFA Championship.
“I am pretty confident that we can go out there and execute and get a favourable result,” he said.
“The promotion is the aim. When I came in this season, the aim was to move the team forward for the Championship. So far, we are on track but for us to get forward, we need to not lose to Police National.”
Even though they head into the second leg with the lead on aggregate, Fitzgerald said he is looking at the two legs as two halves of a game.
He said the plan now is to ensure his team can press on with their advantage as they face Police National away for the second leg. The aim for Cooreville will be to improve their defending to avoid ‘preventable goals’.
“It’s a two-legged quarterfinal so you can look at it now as it being half-time. So if you are leading by one goal at the half-time interval, then you need to plan the second half. We know it’s going to be a tough game. Police would have seen what we have done but also, we would have seen what they have to offer.
“Both goals they scored were preventable goals. I think we basically gifted them both goals so we’re going to have to work on that for this week,” he said.
In the other fixtures of the quarterfinal round, New Kingston got the better of Duhaney Park 1-0 while August Town clipped Maxfield Park 1-0.
The quarterfinals fixture between Allman/Woodford FC and Seaview Gardens FC ended 1-1.