Taking finals to National Stadium was part of the vision

Taking finals to National Stadium was part of the vision – Dean

Aug 07, 2014 Sports

By Rawle Welch
Mindful of the risk involved in taking its flagship football competition to the 10,000-plus capacity National Stadium, cellular service giant Digicel nevertheless made the decision to do just that and the response by the fans must be an encouraging one for the Organisers of the biggest Schools Football Tournament to ever be staged in this country.

Gregory Dean

The Annual junior football extravaganza which is in its fourth edition and which has covered the length and breadth of this country, while exposing participants to the diverse culture and geography of this South American territory, ended on Sunday in front of thousands of fans from all parts of the land.
It must be noted also that from all indications they seemed to appreciate the raw and in many cases developing talent that was on exhibition amongst the four teams.
Kaieteur Sport was present at the final and had the opportunity to briefly speak with the Company’s CEO Gregory Dean to get his thoughts on how well the fans responded to the call to attend the games and about the move by his Organisation to retain the National Stadium as the venue for the final.
Dean said it was all part of the vision of the Company since the tournament’s birth to get it bigger and better and while many may say it was a risk for them to move to the much larger venue after just four short years, because of the support the event had received over the past three years, they were confident that exerting a little more energy and vigorous advertising could garner the desired results.
“When we had the blueprint we were always thinking about having the finals played at the National Stadium, we took the chance and brought it in its fourth year and we are pleased with the support from the fans,” Dean stated.
He added that the Company was always thinking about developing it into a true national tournament which could then produce enough quality players to feed the national programme that would ultimately make Guyana a more formidable opponent within the sport.
Dean as he had done on previous occasions assured all stakeholders that the Company has no intention of scrapping the tournament any time soon.
Meanwhile, an examination of this year’s tournament would reveal that the event is gaining momentum and popularity among fans and stakeholders and even though a few areas of concern surfaced it would be thoughtless not to recognise the work done by members of the Organising Committee that made the tournament a success.

A section of the thousands of fans that attended the Digicel Schools Football Competition 2014 final at the National Stadium.

It will take more diligent work to bring it to where it ought to be, but they deserve a pat on their backs for working tirelessly to ensure that despite some unhelpful occurrences the tournament was conducted in accordance with the rules that was setup to govern it and that deadlines were met.
It must also be remembered that a lot of ground has been covered over the four short years and much was learnt and every year the Committee after careful review has been eliminating previous errors and very soon fans and stakeholders could look forward to a near flawless tournament that will be able to withstand scrutiny.
With the continued support of the Company there is fair optimism that the Annual Digicel Junior Football spectacle will be able to rival or even surpass any other at the same level in the Caribbean.
Another important feature is the fact that even though eventual winners Christianburg / Wismar Secondary School successfully defended their title to make it three in a row, the standard among the teams this year has improved tremendously and fans are already holding their breaths in anticipation of what will happen next year since most of the schools have promised to start their preparations much earlier.