Jahmiah Pettigrew greeted the final whistle with a huge sigh of relief. His players’ response was equally reflective, the embraces, smiling faces and high fives signalling a difference in the joyous celebrations.

“Aaaah! It feels good to get the first win of the season, get that monkey off the back, that old cliché. I hope we can spring off our season with this win today,” admitted Pettigrew, smiling from cheek to cheek, following their victory over Rockfort FC in the opening game of Friday night’s double-header at Constant Spring Complex.

In four previous tries since gaining promotion this season to the Magnum KSAFA Super League, Mountain View FC had come up virtually empty-handed, drawing once with arch-rivals Santos and losing the other three matches.

“Truth be told, I’ve been pleased with the performances. Even though we’ve been losing games, we’ve seen where we’ve improved in areas and today’s win is a result of that improvement and I hope we can (use it as the) catalyst to go forward,” said Pettigrew.

He added: “What I’m encouraged by is the defending, we didn’t slack off today, we concentrated for 90 minutes, or 95 minutes so we could get the three points. But we’re still turning over the ball a bit too easily in midfield, the transition from midfield to forward, so we just need to work on that and the defensive side of the game as well.

The defining moment came at the 19th moment when Antonio Russell capitalised on an error by usually reliable veteran goalkeeper, Russell HoSang, and scored.

“We made a very silly mistake in the first half by the goalkeeper that cost us the goal. That was the only goal scored,” noted Rockfort FC’s coach Clive Brown.

“We created numerous chances, but (we) just did not score our chances. That is our Achilles heel, we’re not scoring goals although we’re creating chances. It’s very sad and we need to fix it. We’ve been working on it feverishly on the training pitch, we just need to go out there and put the ball in the back of the net when we’re creating chances like those,” bemoaned Brown.

Chances apart, his team got a decent opportunity to pull back into the contest when Mountain View FC’s Fernando Fernandes was given a straight red card for a dangerous sliding challenge approximately 20 minutes from the time.

However, in a game of alternative attacking and with Mountain View holding their own with a solid backline and skilful forwards on the break, Rockfort did not help their cause as they chose the most easily defendable form of attacking, route one, to launch their offensives.

Asked about the main advantage, Brown said: “I didn’t think we utilised it. We went a little bit too direct, we wanted to play long balls and go through the middle, while in my estimation if we had forced them wide and stretched them and get quality crosses or bring the ball inside, it would’ve better served us, probably we could’ve won the game,” he reasoned.

The fifth-round win moved Mountain View FC off the cellar and up to fourth, one point behind Rockfort FC and three more than Santos.

Meanwhile, Central Kingston moved to the top of Zone B when they defeated Boys’ Town FC 2-0 in the night’s closing encounter. Chantamoi Taylor scored at the 10th minute and Andre Smith doubled the score at the 29th minute.

In registering their fourth-consecutive win, Central Kingston took over the lead and advanced their tally to 12 points, while Boys’ Town stayed third on seven points. Brown’s Town, on 10 points, will play their fifth round match against Santos today at 5:00 pm, while at 7:00 pm Molynes United will play Meadforest FC.

There will also be three Magnum/KSAFA Major League Zone B matches. August Town will host Greenwich Town at UWI Bowl, Allman/Woodford vs Liguanea United at Aplha Boys’ and Bull Bay will welcome New Kingston at Bull Pen. All matches are set to begin at 3:00 pm.