The thought of a Li­onel Mes­si, Cris­tiano Ronal­do and even a Ney­mar Jr be­ing among us in the Sec­ondary Schools Foot­ball League (SS­FL) is not too far-fetched, said Lisa Mor­ris-Julien, Ju­nior Min­is­ter in the Min­istry of Ed­u­ca­tion.

Mor­ris-Julien’s com­ment came at the launch of the SS­FL sea­son at the Hy­att Re­gency Ho­tel in Port-of-Spain on Thurs­day be­fore a large ap­pre­cia­tive crowd that com­prised mem­bers of the SS­FL ex­ec­u­tive, spon­sors and sev­er­al oth­er dig­ni­taries.

The league is set to kick off on Sep­tem­ber 8 with a clash of last year’s Co­ca-Co­la and Pre­mier­ship fi­nal­ists St Bene­dict’s Col­lege and Fa­ti­ma Col­lege at the Hase­ly Craw­ford Sta­di­um, Mu­cu­rapo from 4 pm.

And to en­sure that all get the op­por­tu­ni­ty to see the match­es this sea­son, ei­ther via tele­vi­sion or via an App, Sports­Max, the re­gion­al sports ca­ble net­work an­nounced through its chief ex­ec­u­tive of­fi­cer (CEO) Nicholas Matthews that it has re­newed its three-year con­tract with the schools’ league.

Sports­Max is one of two spon­sors re­new­ing its con­tract with the SS­FL, with the oth­er be­ing Co­ca-Co­la, the ti­tle spon­sor of the league In­ter­Col play-offs.

This year the league will al­so boast of re­tain­ing long­stand­ing spon­sors Shell as well as the Na­tion­al Gas Com­pa­ny (NGC) who through its head of Com­mu­ni­ca­tion and Brand Nico­la Ghouralal, said they want to in­vest in hu­man en­er­gy.

Ghouralal said her com­pa­ny’s spon­sor­ship of the league is an in­di­ca­tion that they be­lieve in the youth.

In 2022, St Bene­dict’s de­feat­ed Fa­ti­ma 3-1 to claim the Pre­mier Di­vi­sion ti­tle, but the Fa­ti­ma boys re­turned to gain sweet re­venge in the Na­tion­al Co­ca-Co­la In­ter­Col fi­nal by win­ning 1-0 at the Hase­ly Craw­ford Sta­di­um.

The league rep­re­sent­ed the fu­ture of T&T on and off the field. Yes­ter­day, Mor­ris-Julien said, as a for­mer foot­baller her­self she knows of the ef­forts and ben­e­fits of the league and didn’t doubt the fact that a fu­ture star foot­baller can be in the league.

“The Sec­ondary School Foot­ball League has a lega­cy of fierce com­pe­ti­tion and friend­ly ri­val­ry. I grew up in a time with the Blue Thun­der (El Do­ra­do East) and the Green Ma­chine (St Au­gus­tine Se­nior) and it has main­tained a strong fol­low­ing from not on­ly the stu­dents but al­so from the com­mu­ni­ties of these schools. To this day, every­one can say their favourite foot­ball team,” Mor­ris-Julien said.

“In all ar­eas of youth de­vel­op­ment, you know the African proverb that it takes a vil­lage to raise a child. The Sec­ondary Schools Foot­ball League is in­deed a vil­lage that the Min­istry of Ed­u­ca­tion is proud to be part of.”

Fol­low­ing on the heels of the Com­mon­wealth Youth Games, which Mor­ris-Julien said pro­vid­ed an op­por­tu­ni­ty for young ath­letes to show­case their tal­ent, she not­ed al­so that the SS­FL presents yet an­oth­er op­por­tu­ni­ty for our young ath­letes to shine and show their skills in sports.

“I grew up with Stern John, Dwight Yorke, Ja­son Scot­land, Ken­wyne Jones, and it’s not im­pos­si­ble that one day, Mes­si, Ronal­do, and or Ney­mar could be among us to­day,” Mor­ris Julien said.

“Sports as we know it, is not mere­ly a phys­i­cal ac­tiv­i­ty but it’s a pow­er­ful tool for char­ac­ter build­ing and dis­ci­pline. It’s a plat­form that fos­ters life­long skills that ex­tends far be­yond the play­ing field. Through sports, we learn the im­por­tance of ded­i­ca­tion, we learn dis­ci­pline, time man­age­ment, and the pur­suit of ex­cel­lence.”

This year the league will fea­ture some 6,000 play­ers from 100 reg­is­tered schools in 398 teams. And among these fig­ures will be 10 teams from a new 13 and Un­der girls’ di­vi­sion that will come on stream, come Sep­tem­ber.