Triple-header to kick-start SBF season

Schoolboy football (SBF) fans will be treated to a day filled with excitement as the 2024 staging of the Inter-Secondary Schools Sports Association (ISSA) Manning and daCosta Cup competitions will open with a triple-header at the Montego Bay Sports Complex in St James.

As is customary with the competition, the season opener will feature the reigning schoolboy champions from the urban and rural areas.

Manning Cup champions Mona High will start the festivities as they will take to the field first in a 2 p.m. kick-off against Waterford High in Zone B.

Mona, led by head coach Craig Butler, will be hoping they can defend their title having won the school’s first-ever Manning Cup last season.

Under Butler, Mona have seen a tremendous rise to the pinnacle of the Manning Cup. The team made their first-ever appearance in the semifinals during the 2022 season before capturing the title a year later.

Their opponents, Waterford High, will be hopeful they can put the champions to the test. Waterford missed out on the second round last season having finished third in their group behind St George’s College and Campion College.

In the day’s second match, reigning daCosta Cup champions Clarendon College will take on Denbigh High in a 4:30 p.m. fixture.

Clarendon College will be hoping for their third successive hold on the daCosta Cup title following their title-winning campaigns in 2022 and 2023.

While a win would set the tone for their season ahead, Denbigh High are ready to stand in their way to all three points.

Denbigh will be hoping to better their performance from last season where they were eliminated at the first round by just two points, finishing third in their group behind Glenmuir High and Central High.

In the day’s curtain-closer, Cornwall College will draw battle lines against Herbert Morrison Technical in a 7 p.m. kick-off.

The two titans of St James will entertain their home crowd as they seek to get the early advantage in Zone A.

Cornwall will be hoping to end their schoolboy title drought with their last crown coming back in 2018 in the Champions Cup and their last daCosta Cup title in 2016.

For Herbert Morrison, the goal will be to guarantee a positive start to their campaign and secure the early bragging rights in St James as their most recent daCosta Cup title came back in 1988.