Football: Division one league St Michel drop points against Foresters |20 May 2017

St Michel dropped points against Foresters as they had to come from behind to earn a 1-1 draw at Stad Linite on Thursday in a first division league meeting.

This match began with a minute’s silence in remembrance of a relative of a member of the Foresters management who passed away this week.

Both teams had reshuffled their pack after defeat in their previous outing with notably St Michel missing Yannick Manou through illness and Nelson Laurence who was suspended, while Foresters were without former St Michel’s Malagasy defender Leonard Besabotsy through suspension and dropped their Tanzanian striker Hussein Bakari to the bench.

Foresters made the brighter start in this encounter as they almost broke the deadlock in the 4th minute when young striker Ryan Henriette latched onto a through pass but he shot wide.

St Michel, who struggled in this half, had a decent chance in the 15th minute to go ahead from captain Alex Nibourette’s inch-perfect cross to Leeroy Corallie at the far post but he headed straight at goalkeeper Elvis Leopold.

Foresters continued though to dominate proceedings and in the 35th minute St Michel were let off the hook as Henriette left two defenders in his wake to bore on goal but he failed to hit the target.

Henriette again could not open the scoring in the 42nd minute after his teammate Brandon Labrosse stole the ball from Malagasy Jocelyn to set him up but his shot was saved by goalkeeper Alvin Michel.

Seconds later, Labrosse showed him the way to score as he battled for the ball in the St Michel penalty area and then thumped a low shot past goalkeeper Michel to make it 1-0 at half-time for a deserved lead.

St Michel made a double substitution at the start of the second period as they replaced Malagasy defender Nassure Beanjara and Kenner Nourrice and in came Basil Bertin and Ghanaian Emmanuel Nuhey.

As for Foresters, they suffered a major setback as they lost Malagasy defender Edgard Nandresena to a leg injury in the 49th minute which required a lot of re-adjustment in their defence.

St Michel were a different side as they carried the game to their opponents and on the hour mark, Malagasy Hassan Aly floated a long ball over the Foresters defence to Corallie but he blazed wide.

St Michel levelled matters in the 66th minute from a ball down the line by captain Nibourette to substitute Graham Cafrine who had replaced Andy Mougal. Cafrine got the better of Brian Dorby who pulled him down and referee Alix Bonne had no hesitation to point to the spot for a penalty.

Jocelyn stepped to take the spot kick but it was pushed away by goalkeeper Leopold though the Malagasy striker got a second bite of the cherry to stab home the rebound to make it 1-1 much to the relief of his supporters who were now urging their team to go in search of a win.

However, Foresters went close with a counter in the 71st minute when substitute Tanzanian Hussein  Bakari laid the ball to on loan St Michel defender Nick Labiche whose half volley flew agonisingly wide of goalkeeper Michel’s post.

Three minutes later, Foresters, who had had to defend for long periods in this half, had another glorious opportunity to regain the lead from substitute Nelson Etienne’s threaded pass to Labiche whose superb cross was met by Bakari’s header and it required a tip-over save from goalkeeper Michel as the ball grazed the bar on its way into corner.

In the 83rd minute, St Michel rode their luck as Bertin clattered into Foresters’ defender Mike Lesperance with a two-footed tackle but referee Bonne only dished out a yellow card when it could easily have been red as Foresters’ players made their feelings known to the official.

St Michel rallied as the minutes ticked way and in the 85th minute, Trevor Poiret pounced on a loose ball on the edge of the penalty area to volley at goal but goalkeeper Leopold parried his shot away from danger.

A minute later, as St Michel pressed for a winning goal, Nuhey surged into the penalty area and appeared to be tugged back by substitute Etienne but the official was not convinced it was worthy of a penalty

Soon after, Poiret sent in a teasing cross which was missed by Corallie’s outstretched leg and the ball rolled to Cafrine at the far post and his goal-bound shot was cleared on the goal-line by Dorby.

St Michel’s last chance to secure victory came on the stroke of full-time as Norvil Gaspard flicked the ball to Poiret who let fly a cracking low shot from 25 metres out but goalkeeper Leopold did well to push the ball onto the post and it rolled invitingly to Corallie who looked odds to score in an open goal but Foresters defender Marlon Sophola produced a last-ditch tackle to deny him and help his team to a hard fought point as St Michel dropped two points after their loss to St Louis the previous week.

Foresters coach Rodney Choisy was pleased with his team’s gutsy performance and felt they could even have won this match.

“We had a very good first half but injury to our central defender forced us to re-adjust as we played more defensively in the second period. But I am convinced we could have won if we had not lost Edgard in defence though overall it was a good performance,” claimed coach Choisy.

As for St Michel manager Andrew Jean-Louis, he thought the re-shuffling of the starting line-up failed to work out but added that they should have won based on their second half dominance.

“We were out of sorts in the first half due to the enforced changes to the starting line-up as we changed players position, but we improved drastically after the substitutions after half-time and we were just unlucky not to win as we dropped two points,” the St Michel manager told Sports NATION.

R. J-L.