PHC Zebras 3 Boulevard Blazers 0

Despite his team finishing top of their group, Scott Morton was underwhelmed by PHC Zebras’ comfortable win over Boulevard in the Dudley Eve Trophy at Police Field yesterday.

Already certain of a semi-finals berth after beating Devonshire Cougars in their group B opener, PHC led 2-0 at half-time thanks to goals from Marco Warren and a penalty by captain Cecoy Robinson.

Tre Ming added a third midway through the second half to ensure it will be Cougars rather than Boulevard who advance to the semi-finals. Boulevard had to avoid losing by more than two goals to reach the last four.

Morton, whose side won the Charity Cup against Robin Hood, said he was unhappy with aspects of his team’s display.

“I wasn’t happy with the performance at all,” Morton said. “Boulevard brought what they normally do and I expected that, but it was totally unacceptable by our players.”

Morton did not feel that complacency was the root cause of his team’s under-par performance.

“That definitely wasn’t on my mind and certainly wasn’t part of our pregame talks,” he said.

“I don’t know if the players decided to think like that during the match and I hope they didn’t think like that.

“I must give credit to Boulevard and they kept fighting but we must do a better job at executing our plan.”

The biggest positive Morton took from the victory was PHC’s third consecutive clean sheet.

“It’s three wins in three matches and no goals conceded — I can definitely take something from that,” he said.

Warren, one of the smallest players on the pitch, glanced home a header from a Robinson free kick in the 34th minute to give Zebras the lead.

Robinson then converted from the spot just before half-time after Keishon Bean was pulled down by Boulevard goalkeeper Jahhi Shakir.

Boulevard battled hard on a pitch that renders it difficult to play passing football but rarely threatened the PHC goal.

The closest they came was in the first half when Tai-Vince Douglas struck the top of the crossbar from a free kick.

PHC might have been far from their best but they still had too much quality for a Boulevard side that lacked cutting edge without Ian Coke, last season’s top-flight leading scorer and MVP, who has joined Dandy Town.

It was no surprise when midfielder Ming completed the scoring when he rounded the outrushing Shakir before side-footing into an empty net in the 65th minute.

Boulevard’s woes were compounded when defender Keemo Smith suffered an arm injury late on and was substituted.

Mikre Pace, the Boulevard caretaker coach, said he was disappointed by his side’s lack of scoring chances.

“With two goals [down] we could still make it to the semi-finals,” said Place, whose side drew 1-1 with Cougars in their opening group game.

“It kind of forced our hand to push men forward and it opened up the game a lot more. I can take some positives and we didn’t let PHC play their game. We shut them down but couldn’t capitalise on the few chances that we did have.”

SCORERS

PHC Zebras

Warren 34, Robinson 42 pen, Ming 65

TEAMS

PHC Zebras (4-3-3): S Trott — K Abraham (sub: D Albouy, 60min), D Usher (sub: D Lodge, 60), M Lambe, M Waldron — T Ming, M Warren, C Robinson — O Tucker (sub: J Iris, 60), K Bean, C Castle. Substitutes not used: Q Hunt, D Lightbourne, M Dill

Boulevard (4-3-3): J Shakir — J Williams, K Smith (sub: O Cox, 87), A Smith, K Davis — N Smith, A Famous, Z Stovell — R Tyrell (sub: S Samuels, 55), T Douglas, D Taylor. Substitutes not used: R Burchall, J Samuels, O Cox, E Khiry, T Butterfield. Booked: Taylor

Referee: A Francis