With a huge crowd on hand the Mabouya Valley 2013 football season officially kicked off Sunday with a soccerrama at the La Ressource Playing Field.
Ten participating clubs from the various communities took part in the soccerrama, signalling the start of a busy football season. RYO won the soccerama defeating Rovers in the final on penalties.
Four tournaments are set to take place this year, starting off with the Mabouya Valley Promotional Competition which starts this weekend. Two matches have been carded with 2012 Champions Chesters set to take on Monarch on Saturday while on Sunday Togetherness Youth face off against Spurs. Both matches kick off at 4 p.m.
President of the Mabouya Valley Youth and Sports Council, Kendel Emmanuel, explained that the Promotional Competition will be used to select the Mabouya Valley representative team that will try to qualify for the St Lucia Football Association (SLFA) First Division Tournament.
The next competition taking place is the EC Global Mabouya Valley Under-20 Youth Tournament. It will be followed by the District Representative (Shawn Edward) Tournament with Aux Lyons United hoping to defend their title. The season comes to a close with the Guinness Mabouya Valley Tournament, with Survivors looking to make it two in a row.
Emmanuel who is excited about the upcoming tournaments said “all in all I think we are in for a packed football season. There is a lot of football to be played and I hope we will have a very successful season.”
When asked about any female competitions for the year Emmanuel replied: “No we do not have any female competitions. Last year we were successful in our revitalization of female football that was dormant for quite some time in
Mabouya Valley. What I can assure you is that we will be having a representative team at the SLFA Female Competition which is slated for October or November this year.”
In the past Mabouya Valley the mecca for football in St Lucia featured prominently in the Blackheart Knockout Football Tournament. Lately though they have not played to their potential.
Emmanuel agreed.
“I know the last three years our performance has been way below par. We have gone back to the drawing board. We made some changes which paid off with our success at the SLFA Football Cup Tournament, where we made it to the finals before losing on penalties to Marchand.”
Emmanuel is confident that this year’s Mabouya Valley team will carry that momentum into this year’s Blackheart Knockout Football Tournament and put on a much better show. Count on it!
