KINGSTON, Jamaica — Nearly two decades after their last semi-final playoff, Excelsior High will be hoping history is on their side when they face Eltham High again in the Inter-Secondary Schools Sports Association (ISSA) Wata Manning Cup.

Both schools batted back in 2006 with Excelsior emerging victorious and going on to lose the final to Bridgeport High. That year, Eltham were the Walker Cup champions.

But since then, neither school has featured in another semi-final until now, some 19 years later, and Keon Broderick, head coach of Excelsior, was beaming with joy after not succumbing to the pressure of reviving a former powerhouse in schoolboy football.

“We wanted to get it done to reach this stage. I mean, when you have gone 19 years without advancing to this stage of the competition, there is some amount of pressure but we remove that pressure from them because I mean they are a young team and they were not a part of the fielders in the past,” said Broderick, after seeing off a spirited Charlie Smith team that threatened to derail their plans.

Excelsior is a nice blend of senior and young players that are eager for success, having lost the Walker Cup final last year at Mona High, while the Under-16 team lost the final to St Andrew Technical High School (STATHS).

“They are also a quality team and we use that to motivate them to focus on getting in the semi-finals and they did a good job. But I would not say there was a ton of pressure. Most of the pressure was on me,” Broderick pointed out.

Excelsior finished second in Zone A with six points behind favourites Jamaica College, which defeated them 2-1 in the quarterfinal round. But they rebounded with a 3-1 win over Hydel and a 1-0 win over Charlie Smith High and booked their spot in the last four.

“Adversity builds character and that is something that we preach to them whenever it gets difficult. Football is also a teacher. It teaches your life skills and whenever life gets difficult, it’s for you to get up and keep going and that’s how the game went today,” said Broderick.

“This is a quality unit. They have been working hard and just trusting the progress and trusting in the work that we have done from pre-season and in the years past,” said Broderick.