Georgetown Football Club (GFC) and Santos FC were the victorious teams in the final two round-of-16 matches in the Banks Beer Knockout Cup at the Georgetown Football Club Ground on Wednesday evening.
GFC and Santos FC recorded wins by margins of 2-0 and 4-2 over their respective opponents Houston Stars FC and Banks DIH All-Stars.
These results mean they will join Alpha United, Riddim Squad, Camptown, Fruta Conquerors and Beacons FC in the quarter-finals on Christmas and Boxing Day.
GFC will face Camptown on December 25th while Santos will face Beacon FC the following day.
The highlight of the evening came in the night’s second encounter which saw the fancied Santos FC (who were reduced to 10 men) triumphing 4-2 over Banks DIH All-Stars unit.
A very exciting end-to-end encounter in rainy conditions that made ball control difficult, commenced with the Banks DIH side settling faster and creating the majority of the opportunities within the first 10 minutes of play.
Banks, playing what seemed to be a 4-3-3
formation, had Hubert Pudro (number 9), one of the three forward players, cutting in from the left-wing but slicing his shot wide.
Then Randy Stoby (number 10) missed two glorious chances when he headed a 10th minute corner kick timidly into the path of opposition keeper Derwin Bennette, then he hit the cross-bar via a free-kick just outside the 18-yard box in the 12th minute.
However, totally against the run of play Gerald Whittington opened the scoring when he struck in the 13th minute for Santos.
The pace of the game continued and Banks eventually got their goal, when a sharp right-wing cross was slotted home by Michael Oie (number 5) in the 30th minute.
Leron Charles restored the Santos lead in the 40th minute when he ran onto a clever “through ball” from mid-field to make it 2-1.
With the last play of the first half Banks made it 2-2 when a galloping run down the right flank from Mike Lane (number 15) resulted in some sharp passing in the box that totally outmanoeuvred the Santos defence and the ball eventually went into the path of Hubert Pudro who scored in the 46th minute.
Similar to the first half, it was the Banks DIH All-Stars who created clearer cut goal-scoring chances, but the lack of clinical precision in the penalty area prevented them from capitalizing on those opportunities.
Santos then made them pay dearly when they got their players into the danger area.
Banks bombarded the Santos goal within the first 15 minutes of resumption and when Jermaine Fraser (number 14) of Santos was sent off for a reckless tackle in the 63rd minute, the ascendancy was seemingly with the All-Stars.
Santos however scored a soft goal via the boot of Mark Glasgow in the 76th minute, then in the 83rd, keeper Ian Peters smacked a long-ball that the Banks DIH defender failed to negotiate leaving Michael Pedro with just the keeper to beat and he made it 4-2.
Earlier in the opening encounter, GFC overcame Houston Stars FC 2-0.
With GFC the clear favourites to win the game, the Houston Stars FC played a tight defensive game, allowing the GFC side to have most of the ball, but then tried to restrict their shots on goal.
Anson Lynch broke the deadlock in the first half with a goal in the 36th minute and in the first minute of play in the second half, Teshawn Blackman scored the second goal.
