UC, USJ-R dispute football title Saturday

The Cebu football community will be treated to a high octane action today (Saturday) with the staging of the Cebu Schools Athletics Foundation Inc. (CESAFI) men’s football finals between former champions University of San Jose-Recoletos (USJ-R) Jaguars and the University of Cebu (UC) Webmasters at the Cebu City Sports Center (CCSC) football pitch.
USJ-R, former back-to-back champions is expected to rely on their hard working although injury-plagued line-up while UC is banking on the championship experience of its multi-titled coach Glenn Ramos and the brilliance of Nigerian striker Famous Ene Azibataran.
This will be the second time the two collegiate football powerhouses clash in a title match with the Webmasters coming out the winner in their previous encounter.
The Jaguars are looking to end their losing skein against the Webmasters who also won their two elimination round matches this season.
“We have to make a lot of adjustments in both offense and defense because their players are carefully selected unlike mine who are mostly from other teams. But we will play with heart and we will play as a team and hope that we will not lose focus on Saturday,” said Ramos.
Their last meeting on September 27 saw UC escape USJ-R, 1-0, to clinch the No. 2 spot and advance in the championship match against the latter. That win also ended the hopes of defending champions, University of San Carlos (USC) of advancing to the title match. At that time, the Webmasters needed a win or a draw against USJ-R to prevent USC from edging them by goal quotient difference had they lost.
“We will be playing our best and make necessary adjustments against them,” said the Jaguars’ head coach Joselito Bono.
The USC Warriors will play for the third place against the University of Southern Philippines-Foundation (USP-F) which they have beaten badly, 5-0, in their last elimination round match last September 27.
The battle for third is set at 1 p.m. while the championshiop match will follow at 3 p.m.