CATHERINE HALL, St James — FOR the first time in more than 20 years, the official opening of the Inter-secondary Schools Sports Association (ISSA) football competition will not be held in Montego Bay, Jamaica Observer West has learned.

The official kick-off for the daCosta Cup and Manning Cup competitions, set for September 10, will be held at Sabina Park in Kingston.

The Observer West has been reliably informed that the poor condition of the field at the Montego Bay Sports Complex in St James has forced the organisers to look elsewhere.

A Jamaica Premier League double-header was staged at the venue earlier this year but the teams and officials had complained about the poor conditions underfoot that affected the games.

Aubrey Duncan, the head groundsman at the complex, had defended the condition of the field then, arguing that “it is as good or better than any other” the teams had played on that season.

He further reasoned that despite the expected major rehabilitation set to be done at the venue, only minor work would be undertaken on the field. “We can’t just start doing all that we want to do, we need to wait for the Government’s schedule as they will be bringing in equipment and work will be done, so we have to wait on them so we can be synchronised,” he pointed out then.

Jarrett Park in Montego Bay and later the Montego Bay Sports Complex, also in the resort city, have for decades been the ‘home’ of the senior football competitions played among schools outside of the Corporate Area.

Initially, ISSA had alternated the kick-off between the National Stadium in Kingston and the St James facilities, until the latter was chosen for the official opening games.

The competitions were launched in Kingston on Wednesday, with ISSA President Keith Wellington hailing this season as “the return of fully fledged competitions since December 2019” after last year’s “truncated schedule” that saw less than the usual number of schools participating.

The 2020 season was cancelled due to the onset of the novel coronavirus pandemic.

Meanwhile, there will be an increase — seven more than last season — in the number of schools from western Jamaica participating in the daCosta Cup this season.

Fifteen western Jamaica-based schools participated in last season’s competition that was played under revised rules due to restrictions in place because of the pandemic.

When the season begins next month the schools will return to their regular geographic zones, with the first round set to be played on a home-and-away basis.

During a meeting of coaches and sports masters held at Manchester High in June, it was announced that four of the 15 zones will be based in western Jamaica. The format of the competition was also disclosed.

Last year the competition, which started later than the usual early September period, was carried over into January.

At that time there were two zones in western Jamaica for the 15 schools that participated, with games being played at selected venues.

Green Pond High will return to Zone A after competing in Zone B last year and will join Cornwall College and Anchovy, Irwin, Maldon and St James high schools.

Frome Technical, Green Island High, Hopewell High, Merlene Ottey High and Rusea’s High will contest Zone B, while Herbert Morrison and William Knibb Memorial return to Zone C where they will join the returning Cedric Titus High and Muschett High as well as Spot Valley High.

Manning’s School, last season’s beaten finalists, will lead Zone D which comprises Belmont Academy, Black River High, Godfrey Stewart, Grange Hill and Petersfield High.

The top two teams from each of the 15 zones and the two best third-place teams will advance to the second round that will be played on a single-game, knockout basis.

Sixteen teams will play in the quarter-finals in four groups consisting of four teams, and the zone winners will advance to the semi-finals.