A Comprehensive Look at the Weekend’s Sporting Activities

February 27, 2023

A comprehensive overview of the sporting activities of the weekend

Good night and welcome to another edition of Sports Monday, I’m Isani Cayetano. We start things tonight with a look at this weekend’s National Elementary School Volleyball Championships, where the San Marcus RC School dominated the competition for first place in the tournament in the male division. The San Marcus boys won best of three sets twenty-five-eighteen, seventeen-twenty-five, and fifteen-eleven, respectively. The Holy Redeemer Primary came in second. The Most Valuable Player in the Male category went to Brandon Quintanilla.

In the women’s tournament, Holy Redeemer defeated Toledo Christian Academy in straight sets to become the 2023 National Primary School Volleyball Champions. In these games, Holy Redeemer alternately beat their opponents by twenty-five points to nine and twenty-five points to twenty. Shanniel Flores from Toledo Christian Academy was selected as Female MVP. We congratulate these young athletes on their good work.

Let’s turn to the BEBL action. On Friday night at the Civic Center in Belize City, the Benny’s Belize Hurricanes and the Belize City Defenders faced off in a highly anticipated game in which the Defenders overtook the Hurricanes by a final score of 75 to 66. Lorenzo Dillard dropped twenty-seven points to seal the deal in two hours and five minutes of play.

But what’s a sport without a little controversy? Tensions are brewing in the league seven weeks into the Premier League of Belize’s final season. Port Loyola Football Club has publicly stated its objections to a recent ruling by the Belize Football Association Appeals Committee on the eligibility of one of its foreign players. There is much to discuss in this matter. Let’s start with the decision of the Appeals Committee. After a game on 20 January between Port Loyola FC and Verdes FC, which was won by Port Loyola FC, Verdes FC protested their opponents’ decision to field Argentinian Jonathon Moschini for inadmissibility. The protest was brought before the league’s Disciplinary Committee, which ruled in favor of Port Loyola FC. Verdes then appealed to the FFB Appeal Committee. They met and ruled that the Disciplinary Committee’s decision was null and void as the matter was not of a disciplinary nature. They then ruled in favor of Verdes FC. As a result, Port lost three points from his season point tally. Instead, Verdes were awarded three points. So who is Jonathon Moschini and why are Port Loyola FC protesting the Appeal Committee’s decision? We spoke to Port Loyola Football Club manager Leaton St Clair for answers.

On the phone: Leaton St Clair, Manager, Port Loyola FC

“When we tried this, the FFB’s competition director told us that we needed an ITC, which is an international transfer certificate. After consultation with my owner, we did not have a TMC manager. A TMC manager allows the ITC that has a profile to go to a platform and get the ITC. It took about two weeks and we didn’t get any support from the association. My owner approached a partner, Mr. Kenneth Budna, the manager of the Belmopan Bandits. He is a colleague and has attended PLB. We asked him to help us get the ITC. Mr. Budna applied for the ITC through the same TMS manager platform he has. He got it in a day process. It only says that the player Jonathon is moving from the Nicaraguan Football Association to the Belize Federation. Upon receipt of all information, the Competition Director of FFB approves the player’s registration application, approves and issues a FIFA Player ID to the player. On the day of the game, the player was already in the system as a valid, legal and eligible player. The three points are a lot. In PLB, the three points are a lot. Three points matter in the table where we would have been leaders. We recently beat the number one team. We were level with San Pedro. We drew our last game and San Pedro overtook us by two points. So when we beat San Pedro, we surpassed San Pedro by fourteen points. So taking those three points away brought us back to 11 points, which also took Verdes to 11 points.”

Finally, the National Powerlifting Championships were also held in Belize City at the SJC Gymnasium this weekend. There were eight powerlifting weight classes for men and women. First place in the f3 kilos sub junior category went to Mikhail Matus, while second place went to Jahmai Sho. In the women’s category for the 120-pound weight class was Shakira Tsai. Kaeli Burgess was second. The tournament’s overall winners in the men’s category are: Rayford Brown, first place; Kenyon Wright, second place; and William Murillo in third place. For women, Mary Gonzalez took first place, while Edith Ruiz and Joylyne Smith took second and third.

We’d like to thank freelance sports reporter William Ysaguirre for providing footage and statistics from this weekend’s activities. That’s enough for today’s edition of Sports Monday.