August Town resident Wayne Pickersgill has organised a football competition on Sundays to help bring his community together in a positive way.

Pickersgill says his community has been plagued with crime for too long and hosting a football competition weekly will help to spread positivity to the residents.

“It’s a football competition that is rooted in August Town and is geared towards bringing people together because the community is tense right now,” he said.

“We see the adults and the youth coming out to the competition on a Sunday that has been building a good energy in contrast to the negativity and the war.”

Despite not being a structured football competition, it has allowed the players the chance to further their aspirations in the sport by being noticed by local coaches and teams.

“What we’re realising now is that we have some youth that are being discovered,” he said.

“We are being encouraged to take it even further because of the exposure the players are getting.”

Calabar High School’s Manning Cup coach, David Laylor, says he is pleased with what Pickersgill is doing to help the community; especially bringing men together in a positive way.

“The youngsters that would have been occupied otherwise with badness, I was pleased to see some of them on the field and some watching and having fun,” he said.

“It is one of those things that generate interest in sports and get their attention for the moment until the next Sunday evening.”

Laylor says the competition needs to be recognised on a wider scale to show the positive influence of sports in the inner-city communities.

“They might look at it from a different angle in terms of structure like competitions organised by the Inter-secondary Schools Sports Association, Jamaica Football Federation and the Kingston and St Andrew Football Association,” Laylor said.

“This is a local body that has nothing to do with the sporting organisations but it is fulfilling with regard to the social well-being of the youngsters in the inner city.”

Pickersgill says he is hoping to bring sponsors on-board so that the competition could receive more exposure and involve more teams.

“In the past, we would get sponsorship from the member of parliament or whichever political party might have an interest in it,” he said. “We really want to take it on a wider level to incorporate more teams and that would require sponsorships. The idea is to get to a level where we can make it bigger and better.”

Athena Clarke