CATHERINE HALL, St James — Cornwall College flew the flag for daCosta Cup teams on Friday night’s opening set of games in the FLOW Super Cup, cruising to an almost effortless 3-0 win over Denham Town High in the second game of a double- header at the Montego Bay Sports Complex.

Jourdaine Fletcher scored all three goals for Cornwall College as they ran their record to 14-straight wins this season, in all competitions, and were the only rural area team to win as Ocho Rios High, Dinthill Technical and Little London all fell at the first hurdle.

Fletcher netted in the 16th, 37th and 60th minutes, all three goals form close range after combinations with Peter-lee Vassell tore the Denham Town defence apart.

It was the first-ever win for Cornwall College in the cash-rich knockout competition, after they were eliminated in the first round by eventual winners Jamaica College in Montego Bay in the inaugural competition. They now set up a second-round game against the winners of the Rusea’s High vs Haile Selassie game which was slated for last night.

The Cornwall College coach Dr Dean Weatherly was pleased with his team’s efforts and told the Jamaica Observer, “We got off to a sort of lethargic start as I guess the players were trying to feel out their opponents, but once we established ourselves we were able to control the game in all departments.”

The game, he said, also gave him an insight to the Manning Cup style of play.

Despite his team being outplayed and forced to defend for long stretches, the Denham Town coach Omar Edwards was not too displeased with his team’s showing.

“It wasn’t bad, despite no punch upfront,” Edwards said. “We are a young team and we are building. this was a good encounter and we got to play on a very good surface and we were up against a well rounded team.”

It took Cornwall about 15 minutes to figure out their Manning Cup opposition and Fletcher exploited the slow defenders, darting into the box and beating goalkeeper Brian Bennett from close range in the 16th minute to give the daCosta Cup team the lead.

Fletcher doubled Cornwall College’s lead in the 37th. Vassell should have made it 3-0 early in the second half, but his low, hard shot hit the base of the left upright and rebounded into play, where it was cleared out of danger by an alert defender.

After misplaying a ball over the bar from inside the six-yard box, Fletcher completed his hat-trick when he skipped past two defenders on the left and curled the ball past the advancing Bennett delicately into the far corner of the goal.