LACOVIA, St Elizabeth — The steady rise of Lacovia High in the ISSA/Flow daCosta Cup competition is not an accident, says coach Fitzroy Ambursley.

The St Elizabeth school, who qualified for the inter-zone round as one of the best third-placed teams, secured back-to-back quarter-final berths after topping Zone Five on Tuesday.

But while many outsiders are surprised by their progress in the last two seasons, Ambursley said this success is at least three years in the making.

“The majority of this team has been playing together from the Under-14 stage, so what you see now did not happen overnight,” said Ambursley.

He added: “What we try to do is assess the players from early, so we start with PE class. Once we have a group we try to teach them the same system that we use at the daCosta Cup level because we realise that they tend to have a problem adjusting to it when they get to this stage.”

After placing third behind STETHS and Munro College in Zone E of the prelims on 19 points, Lacovia scored 2-0 and 3-0 victories over Annotto Bay High and Fair Prospect High, respectively, in the inter-zone round, before losing 2-1 to Marcus Garvey Technical on Tuesday.

Despite that defeat, Lacovia secured a historic berth in the first round of the lucrative Flow Champions Cup after topping Zone Five on goal difference.

Asked about their ambition for the rest of the season, Ambursley said: “The players are confident. But the aim is to take it one step at a time. We are at the quarter-final stage now, so that is our focus. But before that we have the Flow Cup to think about.”

Lacovia will make their Champions Cup debut on Saturday, before resuming their daCosta Cup campaign next Wednesday in Group P of the quarter-final round.

Manchester High, Paul Bogle High and St James High are the other teams in their group.