ST. PAUL’S UNITED FC WIN 2025 PRESIDENT’S CUP TITLE
For the 4th time in the last five years, SL Horsfords St. Paul’s United won the SKNFA President’s Cup title, after defeating MFCR Old Road United Jets 2-0 on Sunday Feb 16 at Warner Park. After a tepid first half, St. Paul’s broke the deadlock early in the second half with a 55th minute goal from Jovaughn Leader and a goal from the penalty spot in the 75th minute from Kalonji Clarke. Both teams ended the match with 10 men after Jardel Isaac of Old Road was sent off with a straight red card in the 24th minute and Kishawn Phillip of St. Paul’s picked up his second yellow card in the 58th minute. After the match Coach Thrizen Leader of St. Paul’s pointed to his game plan, which gave them desired results.
OLD ROAD READY FOR PRESIDENT’S CUP MATCH AGAINST ST. PAUL’S UNITED
With the President’s Cup approaching, we’ll be previewing the teams that will compete in this prestigious competition. We start with the 2024 FA Cup champions, MFCR Old Road United Jets.
The 2024 season was a brilliant one for Old Road. They won the FA Cup for the first time and ended their year on a high note, winning the first-ever Live Yuh Life Council Cup in December. Following that victory, and since the start of 2025, Old Road has been engaged in intense preseason preparation. During a training in Verchilds this week, Old Road captain Nequan Browne said that the team has been high in preparation ahead of the start of the season and is certainly looking forward to the President’s Cup this Sunday, February 16. “Well, we know it’s going to be a good game, a rough game. I mean, a good test for the first game of the season. So whatever happens on Sunday will just propel us to the rest of the season and we’ll see how it goes,” Browne said.
Coach Alexis Morris is also excited about Sunday’s match and believes Old Road will be ready. “It’s been playing out in my mind since the final four, since last season….Even the times when we thought that we should have gotten over the hump on many occasions, we did not. And so that game for me has been played in the mind…we are now putting all of that into practice and hopefully it would pay off,” Coach Morris said. Old Road will be without their talisman Tiquanny Williams, who recently signed a professional contract with a club in Kosovo. Both Captain Browne and Coach Morris are elated for their player, but know he will be missed this Sunday and for the new football season. “The players, everybody around, the whole community, we’re elated,” Browne said. “We’re happy to see that one of our own gone to do big things, to make a career for himself; support his own family…It’s a good step. I’m happy for him….It’s a good thing to see somebody go up and make it out there because that’s the plan. That’s the plan for all of us to get out there (and become professional footballers.” Browne said what Tiquanny does on the field for Old Road, will never be replicated by another player, but believes this is an opportunity for other payers in the club to shine.
For Coach Morris, seeing Tiquanny’s accomplishment, is a testament to his hard work as a young player from the community. “He often comes out on the pitch day in, day out, by himself working on his craft. Sometimes he would call me to help him as well….I thought it was timely; we just asked him to keep his head on and be strong,” he said.
Old Road will face the 2024 National Bank Group of Companies Premier League champions SL Horsford St. Paul’s United in the 2025 President’s Cup slated for this Sunday, February 16th at 6:30pm at Warner Park.
SKNFA HOSTS CUSTOMER SERVICE AND COMMUNICATION WORKSHOP
In a bid to fulfill its capacity-building mandate, the St. Kitts Navy Football Association, the SKNFA, hosted a customer service and communication training workshop on Saturday, February 1st at Football House. General Secretary of the SKNFA, Techell McLean, outlined the objectives of the workshop. “To provide a better service to our customers both internally and externally, the St. Kitts Nevis Football Association Council, headed by the President, Atiba Harris, has embarked on capacity building when it comes to our staffing,” she said.
The skills of referees in St Kitts and Nevis were sharpened on the weekend of February 1st at the 2025 SKNFA Referees Preseason Seminar held at the National Bank Group of Companies Technical Centre in St Peters. Head of the SKNFA Referee Department, Graeme Browne, spoke to the objectives of the seminar. “The objective of this seminar is to bring everybody on one page. We want to bring all the referees in the Federation because our (country) is unique. It’s two islands, some in Nevis and some in St Kitts. So most times we have the sessions on Zoom, but we feel that prior to the start of the 2025 football season, we wanted to bring everybody in one room, one classroom setting, make sure that everybody have the same understanding and interpretation of the law changes so that when we go on the we’re able to administer, carry out our duties effectively but consistently,” he said.
SKNFA HOSTS FIRST OF MANY CLUB DEVELOPMENT WORKSHOPS
Over the weekend, the St. Kitts and Nevis Football Association (SKNFA) launched the first of several club development workshops aimed at enhancing its member clubs. The inaugural session took place on Saturday, February 15, at Football House. Deputy General Secretary of the SKNFA, Jamir Claxton, shared the focus of the workshop, which centered on club licensing and the SKNFA member assistance grant. “We’re going to be doing a number of workshops for clubs as part of the club development initiative. This one today, we are focusing on the club licensing program and also the member’s assistance program. So we are going through the club licensing and trying to help the clubs to become better at doing what is necessary to make sure they pass club licensing, because it is a requirement for the SKNFA,” he said. “Also, if they’re going to participate in regional or international competition, they must meet club licensing regulations.”
