Fa­ti­ma Col­lege, the reign­ing na­tion­al Sec­ondary Schools Foot­ball League Boys’ Pre­mier­ship Di­vi­sion cham­pi­ons and Co­ca-Co­la In­ter-Col ti­tle-hold­er Pre­sen­ta­tion Col­lege of San Fer­nan­do, will kick off the 2024 sea­son of the Sec­ondary Schools Foot­ball League (SS­FL) when they meet in the sea­son open­er on Sat­ur­day, Sep­tem­ber 7 at the Diego Mar­tin Sport­ing Com­plex, Bagatelle Road, Diego Mar­tin, from 4 pm for the NGC Cup.

This was an­nounced by Lau­rence Seep­er­sad, As­sis­tant Sec­re­tary of Op­er­a­tions of the SS­FL, at the launch of this year's 60th edi­tion of the SS­FL at the St. Madeleine Meet­ing Room, The Brix Re­gency, Coblentz Av­enue, Cas­cade, St Ann's on Wednes­day.

The match against Pres­nta­tion Col­lege will be Fa­ti­ma Col­lege’s sec­ond straight ap­pear­ance in the sea­son open­er af­ter they went un­der to St. Bene­dict’s Col­lege 3-4 in the Pre­mier Di­vi­sion NGC Su­per Cup clash, which was con­test­ed be­tween the Pre­mier Di­vi­sion ‘Big Four’ cham­pi­ons and the Na­tion­al In­ter-Col win­ners to kick off the 2023 sea­son at the Hase­ly Craw­ford Sta­di­um in Mu­cu­rapo last year.

For the du­ra­tion of the 2024 SS­FL sea­son, which runs from Sep­tem­ber to De­cem­ber, 101 schools have reg­is­tered to com­pete across both boys and girls di­vi­sions, with 246 teams in the boys and 80 among the girls, com­bin­ing for more than 7,000 plus stu­dents and ath­letes.

This year’s Pre­mier Di­vi­sion will com­prise 16 teams, with Fa­ti­ma Col­lege and Pre­sen­ta­tion Col­lege of San Fer­nan­do be­ing joined by four-time win­ners Na­pari­ma Col­lege, Ari­ma North Sec­ondary, St Bene­dict’s Col­lege, East Mu­cu­rapo Sec­ondary, San Juan North Sec­ondary, Queen’s Roy­al Col­lege, Spey­side Sec­ondary, Mal­ick Sec­ondary, St Mary’s Col­lege, and St An­tho­ny’s Col­lege, and the pro­mot­ed trio of St Au­gus­tine Sec­ondary and Sig­nal Hill Sec­ondary, both for­mer na­tion­al league and In­ter-Col cham­pi­ons, as well as Mir­a­cle Min­istries Pen­te­costal, who will make their Pre­mier Di­vi­sion de­but in the com­pe­ti­tion with the fi­nal round of match­es set for Fri­day, No­vem­ber 1.

Speak­ing at the launch, Stephen "Byson" Williams, man­ag­er of the Fa­ti­ma staff, said the ex­pec­ta­tions of the team will be to go af­ter all four ti­tles at stake.

He said, "Start­ing with the NGC Cup against Pre­sen­ta­tion, we will be tar­get­ing the four ti­tles up for grabs, with the North Zone In­ter-Col, the Na­tion­al In­ter-Col, and the de­fence of our na­tion­al league ti­tle the oth­ers."

"We know it's go­ing to be tough con­sid­er­ing some of our key play­ers, like cap­tains Chris­t­ian Bai­ley and Jaden Williams, are mov­ing on to Eu­rope and the USA, re­spec­tive­ly, while goal­keep­er Tris­ton Ed­wards has al­so moved on.

"At the same time, we still have the reign­ing SS­FL Play­er of the Year, Michael Chaves, who is com­ing back from a bro­ken leg  with us along with the same de­fence from last year, and to­geth­er with the pro­mo­tion of some Un­der-16 play­ers, we should have a good team." 

At the end of the 2023 sea­son, Hut­son Charles-coached Fa­ti­ma Col­lege, led by Chaves, de­throned St. Bene­dict’s Col­lege as Pre­mier Di­vi­sion kings when they fin­ished with 40 points from 15 match­es, five ahead of the south­ern­ers, to end a 45-year league ti­tle and se­cure the team’s third na­tion­al league crown over­all af­ter lift­ing its first ti­tle in 1973.

And in the na­tion­al In­ter-Col fi­nal, cap­tain and goal­keep­er Kanye Lazarus first pulled off a penal­ty save in reg­u­la­tion time be­fore adding two more in the shoot-out to lead the Shawn Coop­er-coached Pre­sen­ta­tion Col­lege of San Fer­nan­do to a 7-6 sud­den-death penal­ty-kicks win over St. An­tho­ny’s Col­lege af­ter an en­ter­tain­ing 0-0 draw and their third In­ter-Col ti­tle at the na­tion­al lev­el in school his­to­ry.

As in pre­vi­ous years, there will al­so be Zon­al Cham­pi­onship Di­vi­sion com­pe­ti­tion for both boys and girls in the Cen­tral, East, North, South, and To­ba­go Zones.

In the girls com­pe­ti­tion, To­ba­go Zone win­ners Scar­bor­ough Sec­ondary, in­spired by the SS­FL ‘Girls Play­er of the Year’ J’Eleisha Alexan­der, ham­mered East Zone’s Five Rivers Sec­ondary 6-0 to re­tain their Na­tion­al Sec­ondary School Girls Foot­ball League ‘Big-Five’ ti­tle and will start as joint favourites to re­peat along­side reign­ing Na­tion­al In­ter-Col Girls cham­pi­ons and five-time win­ners Pleas­antville Sec­ondary, led by Niki­ta Go­sine.

Among the spon­sors for this year's SS­FL sea­son are First Cit­i­zens, Co­ca-Co­la, NGC, Trend, and Sports­max.

2024 SS­FL Zon­al Cham­pi­onship par­tic­i­pants:

Boys:

East: El Do­ra­do West Sec, Holy Cross Col­lege, Hillview Col­lege, El Doar­do East Sec, St George's Col­lege, Va­len­cia Sec

North: Diego Mar­tin Cen­tral, Blan­chisseuse Sec, Tran­quil­li­ty Sec, Trin­i­ty Col­lege, Mu­cu­rapo West.

South: Pleas­antville Sec, Ste Madeleine Sec, Point Fortin East Sec, Moru­ga Sec, Siparia West Sec, Rio Claro West Sec.

To­ba­go: Scar­bor­ough Sec, Ma­son Hall Sec, Pen­te­costal Light & Life, Rox­bor­ough Sec, Bish­op's High School

Cen­tral: Cara­pichaima West Sec, Cara­pichaima East Sec, Mir­a­cle Min­istries PHS, Ch­agua­nas North Sec, Holy Faith Con­vent, Ch­agua­nas South Sec.

Girls:

Cen­tral: Cara­pichaima West Sec, Mir­a­cle Min­istries PHS, Holy Faith Con­vent, Cara­pichaima East Sec, Ch­agua­nas North Sec, Ch­agua­nas South Sec.

East: Bish­op's Anstey East, San­gre Grande Sec, El Do­ra­do East, San Juan North Sec, Five Rivers Sec, St Au­gus­tine Sec.

North: Bish­op's Anstey High (PoS), Blan­chisseuse Sec, Diego Mar­tin Cen­tral, Holy Name Con­vent (PoS), St Joseph's Con­vent, Tran­quil­li­ty Sec.

South: St Joseph's Con­vent (San F'do), Princes Town West Sec, Pleas­antville Sec, Pa­lo Seco, Moru­ga Sec.

To­ba­go: Sig­nal Hill Sec, Spey­side High, Ma­son Hall Sec, Rox­bor­ough Sec, Pen­te­costal Light & Life, Bish­op's High, Scar­bor­ough Sec­ondary School.

SS­FL NGC

Sep­tem­ber 7 match

Fa­ti­ma Col­lege vs Pre­sen­ta­tion Col­lege (San F'do), D/Mar­tin Sport­ing Com­plex, 4 pm

SS­FL Pre­mier Pre­mier Di­vi­sion Round One:

Wednes­day, Sep­tem­ber 11:

All match­es kick off at 3.30 pm

Ari­ma North Sec. vs St Bene­dict’s Col­lege, to be ad­vised

Na­pari­ma Col­lege vs East Mu­cu­rapo, Lewis St Grd, San F’do

Pre­sen­ta­tion (San F’do) vs Mir­a­cle Min­istries, to be ad­vised

San Juan North Sec vs QRC, San Juan North Sec Grd, Bourg Mu­la­tresse

Spey­side Sec vs Mal­ick Sec, Spey­side Sec Grd

St Au­gus­tine Sec vs Fa­ti­ma Col­lege, War­ren St, St Au­gus­tine

St Mary’s Col­lege vs St An­tho­ny’s Col­lege, St Mary’s Grd, St Clair

Trin­i­ty Col­lege East vs Sig­nal Hill Sec, Trinci­ty