AC Port-of-Spain, joined their ri­vals De­fence Force in the quar­ter­fi­nal round of the T&T Pre­mier Foot­ball League Knock-Out Com­pe­ti­tion af­ter they de­feat­ed cen­tral out­fit Harlem Strik­ers 2-0 at the Diego Mar­tin Sport­ing Com­plex on Sat­ur­day night.

The cap­i­tal city men, play­ing their first game since their heart-wrench­ing 2-1 loss to the De­fence Force at the Ari­ma Velo­drome on June 24, took just 16 min­utes to take the ad­van­tage in the en­counter, com­ing from the boot of Maleek Moses.

Strik­ers, who were fourth on the Tier 2 stand­ings on­ly due to an in­fe­ri­or goal dif­fer­ence to Queen’s Park and San Fer­nan­do Gi­ants, were hop­ing to pro­duce an up­set af­ter the Gi­ants went down to the Parkites 2-1 in the open­ing match of the Diego Mar­tin venue at 5 pm, but it was al­ways go­ing to be an im­prob­a­ble task.

And as ex­pect­ed, they de­fend­ed for most of the 90 min­utes, un­til they were worn down, and Sedale Mc Clean sealed the win for the cap­i­tal city men with a 79th-minute goal to send them in­to the quar­ters.

AC Port-of-Spain may be ea­ger to have an­oth­er crack at the Army Coast-Guard Com­bi­na­tion, but there are oth­er teams hop­ing to lift the knock-out ti­tle as well.

In the run­ning, Po­lice FC de­feat­ed San Juan Jabloteh 5-2 in an all-tier 1-con­test at the La Hor­quet­ta Recre­ation Ground in Phase II La Hor­quet­ta. Play­ing in the first game of the dou­ble­head­er at La Hor­quet­ta on Sat­ur­day, the Law­men, boost­ed by a five-game un­beat­en streak, took the ad­van­tage af­ter just the first minute of play from An­tho­ny Wolfe.

Jabari Mitchell then fired them to a 2-0 lead in the 23rd minute, which they took to the halfway break.

Soon af­ter the in­ter­val, Po­lice, who fin­ished the tier 1 League in the fifth po­si­tion with 39 points, then raced to a 3-0 ad­van­tage when Kadeem Hutchin­son found the nets in the 56th minute. Four min­utes lat­er, they in­creased their ad­van­tage with a Kern Roberts item in the 60th minute.

Jabloteh, forced to de­fend for long pe­ri­ods, then pulled a goal back in the 74th minute from Eli­jah Seechan 4-1, re­duc­ing the deficit to three.

How­ev­er, it on­ly seemed to have an­gered the Law­men who re­spond­ed al­most im­me­di­ate­ly, in the 79th minute from Ki­dane Lewis for a 5-1 lead.

Jabloteh though, had the last say in the en­counter, as Dwight Jor­dan found the nets a minute be­fore the end of reg­u­la­tion time, in the 89th minute, for a re­sult that send them pack­ing out of the knock-out play-offs.

Mean­while, Cen­tral FC, an­oth­er of the Tier 1 teams in ac­tion on the day, got a dou­ble strike from Ri­car­do John in the 10th and 39th for max­i­mum points over the Uni­ver­si­ty of T&T 2-1, as well as pas­sage to the quar­ter­fi­nal round of the knock-out.

In an­oth­er game, Ter­minix La Hor­quet­ta Rangers pre­vailed over Po­lice FC, the Tier 2 team 2-1.

Ja­mal Creighton fired the East­ern­ers ahead in the 55th minute be­fore an own goal by Ricky Mor­ris gave them a 2-0 ad­van­tage. The Po­lice goal came from J’deem Par­ris in the 90+5 min­utes.

RE­SULTS AT THE WEEK­END

AC PoS- 2 (Maleek Moses 16th, Sedale Mc Clean 79th) vs Harlem Strik­ers- 0

De­fence Force- 5 (Brent Sam 6th, 12th, 20th minute (pen), Shaquille Hold­er 50th, 61st) vs Prison Ser­vice- 1 (Ke­muel Rivers 78th)

Her­itage Pe­tro­le­um Point Fortin Civic- 2 (Ron­del Phillip 24th, 90+3) vs 1976 Phoenix- 1 (Jariel Arthur 37th)

Po­lice FC- 5 (An­tho­ny Wolfe 1st, Jabari Mitchell 23rd, Kadeem Hutchin­son 56th, Kern Roberts 60th, Ki­dane Lewis 79th) vs San Juan Jabloteh- 2 (Eli­jah Seechan 74th, Dwight Jor­dan 89th)

Cen­tral FC- 2 ( Ri­car­do John 10th, 39th) vs UTT Tier 2- 1 (War­ren Chase 85th)

Ter­minix La Hor­quet­ta Rangers- 2 (Ja­mal Creighton 55th, Ricky Mor­ris own goal 88th minute) vs Po­lice FC Tier 2- 1 (J’deem Par­ris 90+5)

QPCC- 2 (Sean De Sil­va 20th, Jose Par­ra 38th minute) vs San Fer­nan­do Gi­ants- 1 (Den­ton Headley 62nd)