Tivoli beat UWI through Barnett

Tivoli Gardens benefited from fortune in their continued march up the Red Stripe Premier League (RSPL) table, defeating struggling UWI 1-0 at the Edward Seaga Complex yesterday.

Stephen Barnett scored the lone goal in the 71st minute when his curling shot deflected off the hands of UWI goalkeeper Nickolas King and into the net. The Phillip Williams-coached Tivoli have now won three straight games for the second time this season.

The goal came as a relief to the home fans as their frustration grew with countless opportunities to score missed. Williams said that he expected the type of game he saw against UWI and his team was ready to go the distance to get the result.

"It was a little bit frustrating," Williams said. "But this is one of the games that we know always go this way between us and UWI. But we were prepared to go the long way where that was concerned. They took their chance, they focused, and we came out victorious."

The home side had the better of the chances in the first half as Barnett forced an early save from King when he was put through by Horatio Morgan. After Trayvone Reid blazed a free kick over the bar, Morgan saw his shot sail off target. UWI managed to assert themselves and managed to generate chances of their own. Venton Evans beat two defenders but could not apply the finish as his shot went wide and Nacquain Brown was also wasteful after a good push into the attacking third.

Called into action

Jermaine Johnson found Barnett one-on-one with King in the 63rd minute, but he could only lob the goalkeeper over the bar. Minutes later, UWI substitute Thorn Simpson was put through on goal and had his shot saved by goalkeeper Davian Watkins, who was called into action seconds later as Brown had his shot denied after being one-on-one with him.

UWI head coach Andrew Peart lamented his side's numerous missed chances.

"We created the better chances," he said. "We had three one-on-ones with their goalkeeper. We had two opportunities that we should have finished but we didn't. In these games that you don't take your chances, the opponents might be more fortunate than you and we saw that with the goal."

Yesterday's RSPL results:

D'holden 1-0 Cavalier

Molynes 0-2 Portmore

Tivoli 1-0 UWI

Vere 0-1 W'house

H Lion 3-1 Arnett

Tonight's fixture:

H View v Mt Pleasant - 8:35 p.m.