Pock­et Preda­tors start­ed the sec­ond half of the Na­tion­al Pool League first di­vi­sion in sim­i­lar fash­ion to their sea­son open­er, with a win against the Sicar­ios.

Play­ing away from home at Bil­liards Place in Aranguez on Tues­day, the Bri­an Stod­dard-cap­tained ‘Preda­tors’ bet­tered their 3-2 win back in No­vem­ber with a 4-1 an­ni­hi­la­tion of one of the league’s ti­tle hope­fuls.

Sicar­ios were hop­ing to turn the ta­bles on their op­po­nents af­ter a se­ries of ten con­sec­u­tive wins but the vis­i­tors were just too good. The draw seemed to be fair­ly even but the vis­i­tors struck two vi­tal blows ear­ly to gain the as­cen­den­cy.

Stod­dard led from the front with a com­pre­hen­sive 4-1 win over his op­po­site num­ber, John East­man. The Preda­tors' top man ran out to a three-nil lead, cap­i­tal­is­ing on some sim­ple mis­takes by East­man. The Sicar­ios cap­tain was able to reg­is­ter a win in the fourth frame but could not mount a come­back.

The sec­ond game be­tween Preda­tor Steven Her­nan­dez and Sachin Ram­nar­ine end­ed 4-2 in favour of Her­nan­dez. The pair split the first two frames with Ram­nar­ine forc­ing a three-foul re­sult in frame two. Her­nan­dez won the next two racks, reach­ing the hill with a com­bi­na­tion nine ball tack­le in the fourth frame. Ram­nar­ine stole the fifth but that was all she wrote, two-nil to the Pock­et Preda­tors.

Sicar­ios would get a life­line in the dou­bles en­counter when vice-cap­tain An­dre Creece and Mikkel Govia teamed up against the vis­it­ing pair of Kirk Ram­sawack and Justin Fran­cis. The hosts were clin­i­cal in a four-nil win, in­clu­sive of a tack­le in frame three, to give the home team some hope. That hope quick­ly died when Gre­go­ry Gayadeen sealed the match by beat­ing Al­lan Per­sad 4-1.

The most com­pet­i­tive en­counter came in the fi­nal game be­tween Clif­ford Sookdeo of the Preda­tors and Clint Mara­jh. Mara­jh took a one-nil lead, on­ly for Sookdeo to tie things up at one apiece. The next two frames were repli­cas of the first two, at least on the score­sheet with one to Mara­jh and one to Sookdeo. Sookdeo, how­ev­er, would take the lead for the first time with a win in frame five on­ly for Mara­jh to tie things up at three all. The younger Mara­jh did have a chance to make the score look a lit­tle more re­spectable but a jump shot, which end­ed up off the ta­ble, gave Sookdeo a ball in hand with just four balls left and he made the clear­ance look easy.

The win sees Pock­et Preda­tors take sole pos­ses­sion of third spot on the stand­ings with ten wins and four loss­es. Sicar­ios re­main in sec­ond with eleven wins and three loss­es.

At the top of the NPL first di­vi­sion ta­ble, Rox­bury Shot Callers ex­tend­ed their lead af­ter a 4-1 win against Crazy 8’s at the lat­ter’s Spe­cial Brew venue in McBean, Cou­va. Akash ‘Knuck­les’ Poon, Jonathan Gor­ing, Bri­an Bis­nath and the pair of Raj ‘El Cap­i­tan’ Per­sad and Ken­rick ‘Mon­ty’ Roop­nar­ine were the win­ners for Rox­bury, while Emilio Smith was the lone win­ner for the hosts. Rox­bury now has twelve wins from four­teen match­es Crazy 8’s are sev­enth with sev­en wins and sev­en loss­es.

Ago­ra Stingers, who had the same record as Pock­et Preda­tors go­ing in­to week 14, re­main in fourth, de­spite a sur­prise 2-3 loss to JJ Shoot­ers at Jer­ry Junc­tion. This was the ‘Stingers’ sec­ond loss in a row, while the JJ Shoot­ers are on a two-match win­ning streak. The Jer­ry Junc­tion squad holds down eighth spot on the ta­ble.

There was an­oth­er shock re­sult at the Pyra­mid Sports Bar in Gas­par­il­lo where Unit­ed Stars, who went in­to the Car­ni­val mid-league break in fifth, were host­ing a Ken­ny’s team, which en­tered the Har­mo­ny Hall es­tab­lish­ment in 13th place. De­spite the gulf be­tween both teams, it was Ken­ny’s who emerged vic­to­ri­ous three games to two. Ken­ny’s were not able to move up from 13th spot but they did man­age to knock the Unit­ed Stars out of the top five, down to sixth place.

Scotchie’s Nu­bian Kings were al­so 3-2 win­ners away from home. The ‘Kings’ made the long trip to Princes Town to take on the Dekko All Stars at Bar­code, for­mer­ly Dekko Bar & Lounge. Deck­lon Ash­ton and Mukesh Ram­nath gave the vis­i­tors a 2-nil lead be­fore the hosts won the dou­bles en­counter through the pair of Mo­han Moon­sam­my and Sunil Latch­man. May­ton Charles sealed the win for the ‘Nu­bian Kings’ in the fourth game while Dekko cap­tain, An­drew Har­ri­lal, got a con­so­la­tion vic­to­ry in the fifth and fi­nal game. Scotchie’s

Nu­bian Kings move up one spot from twelfth to eleventh. Dekko, on the oth­er hand, moved down one spot to ninth.

An­oth­er team mak­ing an up­ward move is Lucky Sports. The Williamsville-based team moved in­to the top five for the first time af­ter de­feat­ing Top Shooterz Krew 4-1 at Bil­liards Place in Aranguez. The Ryan Ali-led ‘Lucky’ squad have now won four match­es in a row. Top Shoot­ers oc­cu­py 12th po­si­tion on the stand­ings.

In the on­ly oth­er first di­vi­sion en­counter, tenth-place Pan­thers downed cel­lar-placed Shoot­ing Stars 3-2 at the Play­house Sports Bar in Barataria.

Tues­day’s match­es

Scotchie’s Nu­bian Kings vs Top Shooterz Krew, Mr Bil­liards place, Aranguez

Pock­et Preda­tors vs Dekko’s All Stars, Echo Lounge, Ch­agua­nas

Lucky’s Sports Bar vs Lucky Sports, Crazy 8’s, Lucky’s Sports Bar, Williamsville

Rox­bury Shot Callers vs Pan­thers, Rox­bury, Cunu­pia

Shoot­ing Stars vs JJ Shoot­ers, Pyra­mid, Gas­par­il­lo

Ago­ra Stingers vs Unit­ed Stars, Ago­ra, Ch­agua­nas

Ken­ny’s vs Sicar­i­ous, Ken­ny’s, Ch­agua­nas