North Village 4 X-Roads 1

North Village cruised into the semi-finals of the FA Cup with a comfortable win over Premier Division rivals X-Roads Warriors at Bernard Park on Sunday.

Village had the game virtually sewn up by the interval with first-half strikes from captain Tahmi Williams, Jaizel Smith-DeShields, who grabbed a second near the hour mark, and Tre Ming. Donavan Thompson pulled one back late for X-Roads.

Kenny Thompson, the Village coach, was pleased to have secured a spot in the final four but was far from impressed with his team’s performance.

“We won in convincing fashion and now we are in the semi-finals of the FA Cup, so I’m certainly happy about that,” he said.

“But truth be told we have to play better football. It’s almost as though we don’t have a pride in performance. Yes, the aim of the game is to win, but we have to do better in terms of general basic things; ball control, passing, running with the ball, decision making.

“We must try as much as possible to link the two, to play better while we are striving to get the result. Mixed emotions for me in that we are happy to win but at the end of the day we have to be a bit more consistent with performance.

“That comes down to individual pride and every player having pride in their performance to do things properly. I could not imagine playing football the way that football is played now.”

Thompson’s counterpart, Ralph Bean Jr, attributed X-Roads’ demise to costly errors.

“I think a few individual mistakes at the beginning of the game cost us dearly and we did not recover well after that,” he said.

“From the point of 2-0 on, it was just hard to get back, and they started to control the game and bossed it in the first half in particular.

“We always fight and that’s what you want; you want to still see the fighting spirit and we ended up getting a goal, but on the day they were definitely the better team.”

Village took only six minutes to break the deadlock when X-Roads goalkeeper Jamin Furbert parried Ming’s free-kick and Williams poked the loose ball home from close range.

Smith-DeShields then raced clear but lobbed his effort just wide of Furbert’s far post before X-Roads were awarded a penalty after Village goalkeeper Detre Bell and Emmanuel Mensah collided.

Bell atoned for his error, diving to his right to comfortably gather Jaman Lottimore’s tame effort and Village then piled on the pressure at the other end with Ming dragging a shot wide and Furbert saving Justin Bell’s effort from point-blank range.

The home side eventually broke through again in the 23rd minute when Smith-DeShields headed Ming’s free-kick into the top-left corner to double his team’s advantage.

Bell was called into action again to deny Lottimore and Mensah on a quick raid down the right side and X-Roads again threatened with Tymon Daniels’s header from Lottimore’s corner cleared off the line.

But any potential fightback was stopped dead in its tracks when Ming made it 3-0 in the 33rd minute. X-Roads were caught in possession deep in their own half, which allowed Bell to race clear before squaring the ball for Ming to tap in from close range.

Village should have been celebrating again moments later but Furbert made a brilliant fingertip save to deny Ming on a breakaway. It took until the 55th minute for the fourth goal to arrive when Smith-DeShields’ shot from 25 yards took a deflection off a defender and crept inside Furbert’s near post.

To their credit, X-Roads continued to persevere and they pulled a goal back in the 74th minute when Thompson stripped the ball from Village central defender Kyler Knights on the edge of the box and beat substitute goalkeeper Omari DeShields with a low shot into the far-bottom corner.

Ming should have made it 5-1 in the closing minutes but dragged wide from inside the box with only Furbert standing in his way.

“I should have had at least a hat-trick so I am disappointed in my misses,” Ming said. “I should have scored more but we are into the semi-final, so a great day.”

SCORERS

North Village: Williams 6; Smith-DeShields 23, 55; Ming 33

X-Roads: Thompson 74

TEAMS

North Village: (4-1-4-1) D Bell 7 (sub: O DeShields, 58min 7) - J Harvey 7, T Wilson 6, K Knights 6 (sub: S Somner, 75 6), A Dos Santos 6 - K Harrison 7 - V Perinchief 6, T Williams 6 (sub: N Smith, 58 6), T Ming 7, J Bell 7 (sub: P Smith, 75 7) - J Smith-DeShields 7. Substitutes not used: N Anglin, T Bean, D Dillas

X-Roads: (4-1-4-1): J Furbert 6 - R Beek 5 (sub: D Teleman, 46 6), T Daniels 6, L Simmons 6, D Simons 6 (sub: Z McCarter, 75 5) - C Brangman 6 - D Woolridge 6, K Brangman 6, E Mensah 5 (sub: T Perinchief, 46 6), J Lottimore 6 - D Thompson 7. Booked: C Brangman, Beek, Thompson. Substitutes not used: O Williams.

Referee: A Francis.