MANILA – Kaya Futbol Club-Iloilo showed its strength with a 2-1 beating of Stallion-Laguna Football Club in the first leg of the two-leg 2023 Copa Paulino Alcantara semifinals on Saturday night at the Rizal Memorial Football Stadium.
Veteran Arnel Amita and Justin Baas drilled a conversion each in the second half for the Iloilo City-based football club as they moved closer to a return trip to the championship round.
After struggling with their attempts in the opening half, Kaya-Iloilo broke the scoreless deadlock in the 59th minute as Amita evaded his defenders from inside the box to score from close range.
Not long after Amita’s connection, Baas doubled the advantage as he curled one into the top corner from way outside the box in the 62nd minute past the defense of Stallion-Laguna keeper Hayeson Pepito.
Stallion-Laguna, however, kept their chances alive as Japanese Yuta Nomura eluded the defense of Kaya-Iloilo to slot the ball from close range in the 70th minute to cut the deficit to 1-2.
Kaya-Iloilo then tightened their defense from that point as they prevented Stallion-Laguna from making decent attempts in the final 26 minutes, including the six-minute added time, to escape with the lead.
“It’s a good win for us, we got the early lead and, hopefully no one stayed injured for us,” said Kaya-Iloilo assistant coach Yu Hoshide. “We just have to focus on our second leg game.”
In the other two-leg semifinals series, returning Davao Aguilas Football Club took a 1-0 aggregate advantage after the first leg against the favored Dynamic Herb Cebu-Football Club.
Troy Limbo drilled a connection from close range in the 37th minute to give Davao Aguilas a 1-0 lead, which proved to be enough for them to lead the powerhouse Dynamic Herb Cebu.
The second leg of the two semifinals series is still to be determined by the PFF, with the aggregate winners advancing to the one-game championship round, which will take place next month./PN
