Inaugural U13 soccer tournament

A TOTAL of eight schools will compete in the inaugural Sunridge Build It under-13 soccer tournament to be held at Charlo Primary School on Saturday.

"Being the 10th anniversary of Sunridge Build It and the 10th year since the franchise started the U13 soccer development initiative, it is great to have the first event for the Port Elizabeth schools at Charlo Primary School," the store owner, Willie Zevenster, said.

"The U13 soccer development initiative started in 2005 and this year there will be about 180 tournaments, involving about 48000 U13 players countrywide, making this one of the biggest development programmes in South Africa.

"Children need opportunities to develop and sport is one of those opportunities. Although rugby is very big in our community, hence our involvement with the Charlo rugby sevens, we also have a very large number of soccer players in our community and South Africa is in need of some serious soccer development.

"This year there are eight schools at the event and the aim is to have 16 schools or clubs next year," Zevenster said.

The eight schools participating this year are Charlo, Kabega Park, Moregrove, Parsons Hill, Rowallan Park, Sydenham, Victoria Park and Young Park.

The schools are drawn into two groups and will play a series of round-robin games in their pools to determine a ranking from where they will play in a knockout phase to determine the final winner.

The winning school will receive a trophy and each player will receive a trophy as well as a sports bag.

The programme starts at 8am with the semifinals at 12.15pm and the final at 1pm, followed by the prize-giving.

There will be lucky draw prizes for spectators as well as the schools taking part in the event during the day.