MBU puts up $1m for high school football tournament

A ONE-MILLION-DOLLAR cash prize is up for grabs this summer for the six top high school football teams in western Jamaica.

Montego Bay United FC (MBU) is staging its inaugural Invitational High School Football Competition at the Catherine Hall Stadium on August 16 at 3:00 p.m., before the opening of the schoolboy football season in September.

MBU’s chairman, Yoni Epstein, said as the Jamaica Premier League (JPL) club in the region, the tournament’s aim is to support youth development and growth through sports.

“Development and growth through the youth is our number-one sustainability for the club and its future. We wanted to host an invitational football tournament on the cusp of the start of the schoolboy season, where we invited the best six teams here,” said Epstein, who is also the director of Multi-Sports Development Limited (MBMSDL), the organisation behind the leasing of the Catherine Hall Stadium.

“This is part of the reason MBMSDL has gone after the Catherine Hall Stadium because we need to keep events like this all the time there,” added Esptein, who is expected to make the tournament an annual event for the club.

The one-day competition is like preseason football as teams harvest in-game preparation mode.

The competition will be made up of 40-minute matches with six teams broken down into two groups of three teams. Teams will play each other with the group winners going to the finals. The teams who finish second in their roups will play a third-place play-off.

Director of the MBU youth academy, Leacroft Lettman, said the feedback for the competition has been positive.

“We want to bring back the glory days of football in the west,” declared Letttman.

“We have reached out to some schools and coaching staff, and they are buzzing with excitement.

“What you do in the first and last 20 minutes in football might help the teams build. This can be used as preparation for coaches going into the daCosta Cup season,” Lettman continued.

“This tournament will help to display the talent from the youths. Whatever talent is shown, we can bring them back to MBU for growth and give them that experience with the combination of the senior players,” he added

VIP tickets to the event will cost $2,000, while grandstand tickets will run patrons $1,500.

MBU is targeting schools around the west so as to create a feeder programme.

Adding more fun to the mix, the MBU youth academy will also have a match against another opponent ahead of the final game.

Source: Jamaica Gleaner: Ashley Anguin