Adrian Frater, News Editor
Western Bureau:

Humble Lions place themselves on the verge of qualifying for the 2009-10 Digicel Premier League, when they outclassed and embarrassed Wadadah 3-0 on Sunday night at Jarrett Park in Montego Bay.

The result allowed Humble Lions to join August Town atop the four-day play-off tournament on seven points from three games. Wadadah and the other competitor, St Ann's Brazil, have one point each.

Showing absolutely no respect for Wadadah's history in national club football, the Clarendon-based team took a 2-0 first half lead through Tyrone Buddah and Kevin Mighty. They then had embarrassed Wadadah fans filing out of the park midway the second half, when they scored for a third time through Michael Moreland.

Early initiative

"Our plan was to seize the early initiative and then press on and we did just that," said Humble Lions' player/coach, Keveral Stewart. "We are now in a very good position to qualify, but we are not going to allow complacency to set in ... we just plan to stay focused."

Getting off to an enterprising start, Humble Lions took the lead inside the first minute when Wadadah's custodian failed to gather a powerful cross before the goal and spilled the ball into the path of Buddah, who fired powerfully into the goal, making the score 1-0.

With Wadadah seemingly shellshocked, Humble Lions took control and had Wadadah on the run, with stinging attacks from all angles. In fact, had goalkeeper Tristan Bernard not been alert, the Clarendon team could have well added several goals to their tally.

Going into the final stages of the half, Humble Lions deservingly doubled their lead in the 43rd minute. On a crisp break out of midfield, Mighty dismantled the Wadadah defence with a spirited dribble and with the goalkeeper at his mercy, fired home easily to make the half-time score 2-0.

At the start of the second half, Humble Lions quickly took control but missed chances from Buddah and Tyrone Lampart within the first five minutes prevented them from widening their lead and further stamping their dominance on the game.

Long-range pass

Wadadah had their best moment in the 54th minute when Jeremy Bucknor pounced on a long-range pass before the Humble Lions goal but curled his shot just wide, much to the disappointment of his team-mates.

"We just did not play with the kind of intensity that was required to hold back this determined Humble Lions team," said Wadadah's striker Curtis Palmer. "It is a most disappointing result and this is not what we were expecting from a home fixture."