The great coaches of schoolboy football

Some talented coaches have produced a number of exceptional teams in local schoolboy history.

A number of players from both the Manning Cup and daCosta Cup have gone on to wear national colours, some even while they were in school. Many of these coaches have left a winning legacy at the institutions where they coached.

For Clyde Jureidini, George Thompson, popularly called 'George T', of Kingston College (KC) was without a doubt a standard bearer of the1960s.

Thompson, who died in 2008, won numerous Manning Cup awards and was responsible for putting together the all-conquering KC team of 1964-65 that included players like Neville Oxford and Trevor 'Jumpy' Harris.The Thompson-coached teams won the schoolboy 'triple crown' Manning Cup, Olivier Shield and Walker Cup in consecutive years. When he died in 2008, Oxford described him as "the type of coach that the players would really just give their all for; you would do anything he asked. He always inspired you to do your best, to perform to the best of your ability." Ron Jones of Wolmer's Boys, who won the Heroes Circle school their only triple champion in 1971, was also one of the best he saw along with former Camperdown and Glenmuir High winning coach Patrick 'Jackie' Walters during the 1980s.

"They were consistently good," he said.

Jerome Waite, formerly of Charlie Smith High, is another who he says has an uncanny knack of putting great teams together.

"Jerome Waite with his gang of five players was outstanding in the 1990s," he said

"Bertis' (Neville Bell, St George's College) and Emerson Henry (Rusea's High) had a dominance. Jackie Walters won everywhere he went," he continued.

"And for the 2000s Miguel Coley has a body of work and dominance," he continued.

Walters, considered a legend in annals of schoolboy football, said his earliest influences in the 1960s were KC's 'George T' and Clarendon's Winston Chung-Fah.

"Winston Chung was one I got good experience off. I worked with him for a while. George Thompson of KC, I used to go there every day to watch his 1964, 1965 side," he said.

"But Dean Weatherly, Leebert Halliman and Emerson Henry are coaches that can sit in the conversation with those coaches

"There is also Miguel Coley, 'Bertis' Bell, Jerome Waite, Oliver Clue and Geoffrey Maxwell at Excelsior.

"Dave Clarke kept Tivoli challenging for years and Lenny Hyde as a coach revived Clarendon," he said.

For Weatherly the best coaches he has seen include Steve Bucknor, who won at Cornwall and Rusea's, Frank Brown, one of the few to win Manning and daCosta Cup, (Excelsior and Dinthill), Neville Bell, Jackie Walters and Henry.

"They were able to create one good team after another," he noted

He also had great admiration for Chung-Fah, Paul Banka of Munro, Oliver Clue and Kenneth 'Bop' Campbell at Vere.

"Campbell was a very good coach. Vassell Reynolds, who won titles with Wolmer's and Rusea's and Andrew Edwards, formerly of St Elizabeth Technical, are also thorough coaches," he added.