Kwesi Mugisa, Staff Reporter

A few of the island's youth players will be desirous of putting their talent on display when the Kwise/Kics International Soccer Tournament gets underway at the Lauderhill Sports Complex in Fort Lauderdale, early next month.

At least four teams have already given indication of their intention to compete in the December 12-14 tournament, which will see the local teams play teams from the United States and elsewhere, under the watchful eyes of several college scouts.

The teams hoping to be onboard include Mannings High School, Dinthill Technical High School, McKaulay High School and a Jamaica Public Service invitational team.

inaugural tournament

While still hopeful of more teams coming onboard, tournament orga-niser Karmal Thompson believes the inaugural tournament will be more successful in the future.

"The interest is there from a lot of schools, but the word got out a bit late so some of the necessary things, like visas, will be hard to secure," Thompson told The Gleaner.

"It is going to be a yearly competition, so I am sure the support will pick up as we go along, but we are looking at a couple of changes for next year," he added.

Originally, it had been hoped that at least 16 teams would have taken part in this year's competition, a mixture of the under 12, under 16 and under 19 age group. However, next year the organisers will focus at breaking up the age groups and have them participate in separate tournaments.

semi-professional league

This year the length of the matches in the tournament caters to an exhibition format, as the time will be dependent on the amount of teams taking part in the tournament, and they could also be required to play more than one game.

"I used to play football, but I stopped pretty early simply because of a lack of motivation. It really is hard for an athlete to get a whole lot out of our local semi-professional league," Thompson said, as he explained the motivating factor behind the tournament.

"What we are trying to do is to get our players exposed to another level of the game and give them more hope to continue playing the sport, perhaps even in terms of scholarship opportunities," he said.