LUCEA, Hanover — Linvern Wright, headmaster of newly crowned ISSA/FLOW daCosta Cup champions Rusea’s High, says it is commitment to a task and not necessarily ties to a school that will result in success.

Rusea’s High won their 11th daCosta Cup title, their first since 2011, after beating Clarendon College 2-1 at the Montego Bay Sports Complex last Saturday with new coach Vassell Reynolds at the helm.

Reynolds, who ironically represented Clarendon College in his high school days, was the first man with no prior ties to the school to be put in charge of the team for the first time in about 40 years, following in the footsteps of Emerson ‘Diggy’ Henry, Anthony ‘Follies’ Williams and Aaron Lawrence, all of whom played for the Hanover school.

Wright, who hails from Trelawny, told the Jamaica Observer on Monday following an event held at the school to celebrate winning the trophy, said: “As a principal, I have no ties in terms of attending here either. what I think the matter is that you have a lot of persons who have ties to the school, but it is the commitment that matters.

“I think what is important is that the coach and myself, who might not have come to Rusea’s, have a commitment to Rusea’s and we bring results so that people can understand that it is not just, about having being here, but it’s having done something to actually continue to build on the tradition that we see here, and we believe that we have done that kind of thing in this victory and we hope to do it with many others things as well,” he said.

Replacing Lawrence with Reynolds, he said, was not smooth.

“Naturally, when you have a new coach with the history that Rusea’s would have had over the last 30 years, it would have been rocky and you would have had doubters in the community and people who would have thought that given the history of past coaches, maybe we made a wrong move,” noted Wright.

The principal said, however, that Reynolds’ appointment validated “bold decisions” they made.

“I believe that the win is a respect to the past coaches to the tradition they have left here, and that is one of the first things that we need to recognise,” he told the Jamaica Observer.

“The second thing is that it tells them they must have confidence in the choice of leadership, too, because we are not really making any choice that goes against the wishes of the school or the community, or the wishes of anybody who really thinks that this is something that we really should not have done. What we really wanted to do was make bold decisions, and this is one of the bold decisions that we have taken and something positive has come of it and we are happy with it,” Wright went on.

The victory, he noted, has been positive for not just the students and staff of the school, but the Lucea community on a whole. “Certainly it has lifted the spirit of the students and that’s wonderful. I am happy that I have not seen any displays of indiscipline simply because they have won,” Wright stated.

“What it has done for the community is that it has them understanding that while I want to get the academics up, which is my foremost thing, that I still would want to maintain and sustain whatever history they have in terms of the quality of the football and winning championships and having people see the school as one to be reckoned with both in football as well as other things.

“There has to be balance, we can’t do it without balance; as I don’t want us to be known as a football school. I want us to be known as a school that does well in football but certainly help the students to get to their goals,” he said.

Football is not the only area of success for Rusea’s High, as earlier this year they dethroned STETHS as girls western track and field champions, snapping STETHS’ decades-long winning streak at the County of Cornwall Athletics Association’s Western Championships.

“We continue to work with the resources that we have and we expect them to come out doing very well… we can build on (winning the daCosta Cup) by ensuring that we have continuity, ensure that the boys are strong in school first and foremost, we have to ensure that we support them as of now as many schools would leave them behind.

“We want to meet with parents and those close to them to have them understand that it continues after this and it is important that we have a coach who is a teacher and he understand the value of education and the value of performing well in football and we build on this by ensuring that we give the players a balance,” Wright ended.