By Neto Baptiste
Coordinator of Schools Football, Rowan Benjamin, believes that a similar set-up to that of Jamaica’s ISSA (Inter-Secondary Schools Sports Association), could help to improve the standard and level of planning that goes into all schools’ competitions here in Antigua.
His suggestions come on the heels of fresh appeals by principals of two separate secondary school for a broader collaborative effort when planning and executing school-based sporting events and competitions.
“It’s not only football, but it’s the Ministry’s sports programme that we need the involvement of the principals. I don’t want to look at it as just football alone, because when you look at something like in Jamaica with the Inter-Secondary School [Sports] Association (ISSA) set-up, it is the principals who run that. What I was made to understand is that it was because they were not happy with the way the school sports were running that they formed themselves together and came up with these groups, and it has been doing wonders. Maybe then we can take a page out of their book and do something similar,” he said.
Earlier this week, Principals D Colin Greene and Foster Roberts from the Princess Margaret School (PMS) and Ottos Comprehensive School (OCS) respectively, raised fresh concerns over the lack of communication and what they see as an unwillingness by the Ministry of Sports to involve major stakeholders in the planning process for schools’ sports.
Benjamin reaffirmed that he has no issues with having a round-table discussion with principals on possible ways to improve the schools’ football programme but still believes a broader approach must be taken.
“There is no issue with me in terms of the meeting with the principals because it’s something that I’ve been pushing for years now, but I just don’t know why it is not happening and it’s a situation where you’d have [I’ve] done something before and it comes with a backlash, and I don’t want to find myself in that situation,” the former national coach said.
In recent weeks, there have been a number of security concerns at schools football matches that have led to the postponement of at least one high-profile fixture. Several schools have also pulled teams out of the competition for various reasons.
