S L Horsfords St. Paul’s United maintained their lead at the top of the National Bank Group of Companies Premier League table with a 2-0 win over Honda Newtown United on Sunday March 24^th at Warner Park, despite going down to ten men when Omar Francis was issued a red card late in the first half.

St. Paul’s have 12 points, winning all four of their Premier League matches thus far.

The goals came from Nicquan Phipps in the fourth minute and Kalonji Clarke in the 45^th minute.

The St. Paul’s match was part of a rare triple header on Sunday; the first ending 6-0 to SOL IAS Conaree FC over Trafalgar Southstars; their first win of the season.

The goals came from Errol O’Loughlin in the 24^th minute, Jahquan Hendrickson in the 28^th minute, Byron Phillip in the 46^th minute, Tijani Fahie in the 50^th minute, Quanieki Clarke in the 64^th minute and Shawn Martin (pk) in the 90^th +3 minute.

The second match saw Flow 4G Cayon Rockets also earning their first win of the season with a come from behind to defeat Hotsprings Bath United 2-1.

Venreece Richards gave Bath United the lead in the 53^rd minute before Cayon Rockets equalized 23 minutes later through Vinceroy Nelson. Five minutes later, Shaheem Prentice got the winner.

On Saturday March 23, SKELEC Garden Hotspurs and MFCR Old Road United Jets came to a goalless draw, while Development Bank St. Peters FC delivered a shocked 3-2 come from behind win against defending champions Rams Village Superstars.

Jayan Duncan (10^th minute), Kadeem Rawlins (72^nd minute) and Shavene Boston (89^th minute) got the goals for Hotspurs while the St. Peters goals came from Joseph Wilkes in the 18^th minute and Kimaree Rogers in the 52^nd minute.

The National Bank Group of Companies Premier League continues on March 27^th and 28^th ahead of the Easter weekend.

St. Kitts and Nevis will for the first time host the 2023 CONCACAF Caribbean Shield, a historic achievement for the tiny Caribbean nation. The tournament will run from August 3-13.

The CONCACAF Caribbean Shield, formerly known as the Caribbean Club Shield, is an annual Caribbean association football competition for clubs that are members of the Caribbean Football Union (CFU).

It is a second-tier competition to the CONCACAF Caribbean Cup and was introduced in 2018 for clubs which worked towards professional standards.

Until 2022, the winner of this competition, as long as it fulfills the licensing criteria, played against the fourth-placed team of the Caribbean Club Championship for the place in the CONCACAF League. As of 2023, the winner qualifies for the CONCACAF Caribbean Cup.

The Dominican Republic (2018), Curacao (2019, 2020*, 2021*) and Puerto Rico (2022) have been previous hosts. Through the efforts of President of the St Kitts and Nevis Football Association (SKNFA) Atiba Harris, St Kitts and Nevis will host the tournament for the first time.  The 2020 and 2021 tournaments were cancelled because of the Covid-19 pandemic.

 “This is indeed a historical moment for the SKNFA, our country in being confirmed as host of the 2023 Concacaf Caribbean Club Shield Tournament,” Harris said.

“The fact that Concacaf has entrusted us as hosts, shows the significant strides that we’ve made in less than two years in raising the standard of football in our country. I would like to extend best wishes to all participating clubs, in particular SL Horsford St. Paul’s United FC, who will be representing us as the defending champions of the SKNFA Premier Division.”

The SKNFA Premier League rolls into East Basseterre on Saturday, in a community that has enjoyed much success top flight football in St. Kits and Nevis.

Hosts S-Krave Newtown United take on newly promoted Jones Group Sandy Point FC at 6 pm.

Newtown are at the top of the table after a resounding 5-1 opening weekend win over Bath United. They are coached by Anthony ‘Nets’ Isaac, who had previous successful stints with the club before moving to St. Peters FC for the past two seasons.

He is back home and is looking forward to leading the new look Newtown United to former glory.

Sandy Point, on the other hand, are hoping to rebound from their loss to Garden Hotspurs at home last week Friday.

If they shake off the premier league nerves, they are expected to do better this week.

 “I know we can do better. We saw it at the end of the game where we started pressing high and we started to get into the opponent and we actually got our goal,” said Elzito Warner, a member of the Sandy Point FC technical staff.

“So, I think if we start in games earlier and pressing higher, we could do much better."

 The other match up on Saturday is set to be the match of the weekend.

SL Horfords St. Paul’s United goes up against H.E. Garden Hotspurs at 8:15pm.

St. Paul’s stumbled in their first match of the season with a 0-0 draw to Old Road in Verchilds. They would want to get something from this match to get their season up and running. As for Spurs, they started the season with a win and hope to build on that going forward.