By Neto Baptiste
The coordinator of schools football within the Ministry of Sports, Rowan Benjamin, said that although his team has managed to bring the various competitions to a point of climax, they were plagued by a number of challenges.
Speaking on the Good Morning Jojo sports show, Benjamin said that many of the challenges have dogged the smooth running of the programme for some time now.
“I am not happy with the execution, especially this year. We still have challenges that I spoke to even before the season would have started, that are still there. It is almost like a miracle that we are winding down the school league [but] it looks as though we may be going into next week.
“Schools would have closed but only with the consultations with the principals of these schools that [they] will play next week to finish the rest of the matches,” he said.
The coordinator, who has received his share of criticism over what some believe is the poor running of the schools league, identified a number of areas where additional improvement is needed.
“There are transportation issues and no communication because we still have no [telephone] lines where we work, so I have to use my phone to do the necessary communication and calling schools, but I must thank and congratulate people like Shipwreck [Stanfield Joseph] and Kattian Baltimore,” Benjamin said.
Schools football is set to climax with a number of championship contests slated for this week and next week at a number of venues across Antigua.