ROCKFORT YESTERDAY drenched JNBS/KSAFA Super League title gunners Santos with a bitter-tasting defeat, taking down Rockfort 2-1 at Rockfort.Although not having a chance of qualifying for the semi-final stage of the competition, Rockfort started the game like bouncing bunnies and put the visitors on the back-foot from as early as the sixth minute when captain Rohan Nelson converted a penalty. Six minutes later, the Carlton 'Spanner' Dennis' side was left to contemplate what might have been as Carey Robinson stitched up a shot into Andrew Sewell's net to give his team an early 2-0 lead.
Santos were then caught between a rock and a hard place; tightening their defence while trying to outscore Rockfort. One thing that was in their favour was the evident poor fitness level of Rockfort who were reduced to a crawl after 20 minutes.
This allowed the Santos team to launch attacks from the flanks, one of which narrowly missed its target. On that occasion, Richard West, after being fed by Adrian Reid, let fly a shot from the left side of the penalty area that landed on Ricardo Bailey's crossbar. The goalie's poor reading of the shot seemed to have attracted raised eyebrows from the Santos attackers who tried to beat him from all angles but to no avail.
COMBINATION OF SUBSTITUTES
However, the combination of substitutes Fabian Nethersole and Kevin McLearney, both of who had hardly been on the field for two minutes, produced the goods for Santos.
Nethersole embarrassed Bailey, who left his line to challenge, the attacker for a ball on the by-line but lost out. The latter then squared to an unmarked McLearney who headed into the open net to pull back one for his side. The celebration was tempered when referee Peter Prendergast pointed to the penalty spot a minute later after Hanif Freckleton handled the ball in the area.
However, excellent goalkeeping by Sewell denied Nelson who had converted the first. On this occasion, Sewell went down to his right to block a powerfully hit shot which rebounded to the kicker who found the woodwork.
Santos (32 points) now slip to third in the standings while Bull Bay joined the idle Maverley/Hughenden as leaders (33 points) after whipping Olympic 7-0 at Bull Pen.
Meanwhile, Real Mona and Duhaney Park sent clear messages about their unwillingness to be relegated by pulling off victories in their assignments. Real Mona did so by shooting down the Soldiers 4-3 at Camp while Duhaney Park blanked Barbican 2-0.
