Ministry of Sports Pleased With Early Start to Term 2 Events

The Ministry of Youth Development and Sports got its slate of events for Term 2 underway with the ongoing Under-19 boys’ basketball tournament, which just wrapped up its second week of competition. Some delays aside, inter-house athletics competitions should begin next week, with inter-school table tennis, cricket, volleyball, and girls’ basketball to follow.

Isabel Alexander-Marquis, the ministry’s point person for school sports, has thanked all involved for ensuring a timely start to this term’s programme. 

“Feedback from the schools, I think they’re very cooperative,” said Alexander-Marquis. “And they understand the term and what normally happens in the term, how busy it is. And they try to work as much as possible with the ministry.

“I want to include the collaborative effort with additional stakeholder ministries like the Ministry of Education and the Ministry of Health and the security department.”

After an interrupted first-term programme, with some of the scheduled sports pushed back to the second term, the ministry is putting a premium on execution. The delay allowed for more schools to get involved in the boys’ basketball. Half the eligible institutions signed up for 2025, a slight improvement year-on-year, though participation is not as high as a decade ago.

“We are quite elated that we were able to start off without a glitch this time around,” said Alexander-Marquis. “As you would have known, the Under-19 basketball had to be pushed back from the first term this year, and then we have an additional two teams – that makes it 12 teams in all – with the comeback of Entrepot Secondary and Corinth Secondary. So those are two schools that were not there in last year’s tournament, and we are having them this year.”

Alexander-Marquis insisted that the ministry is ready to be on the go leading up to the Easter break in April. Once school athletics begins in the coming days, it will be all action until the final national events at the back end of the semester. 

The second term is traditionally one of the busiest for school sports, with track and field taking centre stage. Alexander-Marquis explained that alongside the usual inter-house competitions and high-profile events like Island Champs and inter-district primary school athletics, this year’s calendar also includes female basketball and Under-19 male basketball tournaments, making it even more hectic.

However, she said, there is flexibility to ensure all tournaments are completed. 

“Whatever doesn’t happen within the time frame of the term, then after that we have a couple of weeks to finish off whatever tournaments we have scheduled for second term,” Alexander-Marquis said.