X-Roads 0 North Village 7

North Village hammered X-Roads at Lord’s to record their biggest win in the Premier Division this season and remain within a point of leaders PHC in the race for the championship.

Jalen Harvey and Liam Evans each scored twice, substitute Jordan Outerbridge and Pierre Smith found the target once, while an own goal by X-Roads defender Josef Smith completed the rout.

Kenny Thompson, the Village coach, was delighted to see his side rack up the goals and collect maximum points.

“The main thing is that we got the three points,’’ Thompson said.

“It’s nice to score a lot of goals but the main thing, first and foremost, is the three points. We were pleased with the performance overall on a difficult pitch.

“The pitch could have been a little bit better, but we managed ourselves well on the pitch as soft and wet as it was.

“It’s a good win and now we have to turn our focus to the FA Cup next weekend.”

Ralph Bean Jr, coach of a X-Roads side who have now conceded ten goals in two matches and are adrift at the bottom of the league, blamed his team’s struggle on the absence of key players because of injuries, but the former Village captain is not ready to throw in the towel and accept relegation just yet.

“We already know where we stand in terms of players being unavailable,’’ Bean said.

“We have six key players on the injury list right now. We’re hoping that they can be back in the next two weeks and we now have a week off, so that extra week should be enough time for at least three or four of them to be available in the next game.

“We’re definitely in an injury crisis right now, so it’s not really giving us the options that we would have had in the earlier part of the season.

“We were up against a really tough opponent and they are where they are on the table for a reason.

“We had two mental lapses defensively, that’s where we became undone. It became difficult and we were playing a team that has got more tactical ability than us.

“We have to play for all the 15 remaining points. We’re not about to lay down, we still have work to do and we have keep showing up and do our part.”

While X-Roads managed to hold their own in the opening quarter against their superior opponents it was a matter of time before the floodgates were breached and Village opened the scoring 14 minutes into the match when Harvey was allowed a lot of space to beat Q’Shai Darrell at the far past.

Four minutes later Smith failed to deal with a cross from Tahmi Williams and turned it into his own net, with Harvey extending his team’s lead with a header from a free kick taken by Daion Swan-DeSilva.

Village had their fourth goal 13 minutes after the break when Evans finished from close range after Darrell failed to make a clean save.

X-Roads had their best chance when captain Donovan Thompson then saw his brilliant header saved by Village goalkeeper Detre Bell.

Harvey got another chance to score his third goal of the match in the 68th minute, but Darrell did well to come off his line to narrow the angle.

Evans scored his second and Village’s fifth in the 75th minute when on the receiving end of a cross from Outerbridge and two minutes later the two combined for Village’s sixth goal as Evans’s shot from outside the box provedtoo hot to handle for Darrell, and Outerbridge poked the ball into the net.

Smith added a seventh goal for Village on the stroke of full time when he found himself face-to-face with Darrell, and had no problems slotting the ball past the goalkeeper.

SCORERS

North Village: Harvey 14, 30, J Smith og 18, Evans 58, 75, Outerbridge 77, P Smith 90

TEAMS

X-Roads (4-5-1): Q Darrell 5 – J Smith 5 (sub: J Dill, 68min 5), D Leleman 5, C Whited 5 (sub: D Woolridge, 75), A Matthews 5 (sub: T Lowe, 72) – K Richardson 5, T Lowe 5, A Johnstone 6, R Beek 5, D Thompson 6 – C Whited 6. Booked: Beek, Matthews.

North Village (3-5-2): D Bell 7 – T Wilson 6, R Sampson 6, K Knights – L Evans 7 (sub: I Simmons, 79), K Harrison 6 (sub: T Ming, 79), T Williams 6 (sub: T Bean, 62 5), J Harvey 8, D Swan-DeSilva 6 (sub: A Deshields, 79) – P Smith 7, D Wainwright 6 (sub: J Outerbridge, 62 6). Substitutes not used: T Fray, J Smith-DeShields.

Referee: A Francis.