Telecommunications firm Flow, sponsor of high schoolboys’ football for five years running, says that in partnership with Inter-Secondary Schools Sports Association (ISSA), it is continuing its drive to improve the standard of playing fields.

Schoolboy football watchers have long complained about the substandard surfaces, particularly at school-based venues.

As it stands, St George’s College’s Winchester Park base and St Elizabeth Technical’s home field in Santa Cruz are among a very small number of school-run surfaces at an acceptable level to host matches.

Carlo Redwood, Flow’s vice-president of marketing and TV, told the Jamaica Observer Sport Club yesterday, that he is not averse to the idea of limiting schoolboy football games to specific, approved venues.

While it may take away from schools having home advantage and controlling their own gate receipt, the upside is that young players are more likely to develop on better surfaces and fans — both in attendance and tuning in on television — will benefit from improved viewing experience.

He said, however, that ISSA, the entity responsible for running sports in high schools, will have to play its part.

“These are certain things that we are open to and have looked at in terms of how we go forward in developing this football product. The idea is that we want to commercialise it in a way that we are able to make these things happen. I believe they [organisers at ISSA] are [open to these ideas],” Redwood said.

“In my view ISSA should be able to earn enough money via sponsorship and gate receipt to be able to invest in fields. They should be able to say ‘all right, this year we are going to put in four fields’ with a budget to put them in and maintain them, and then add fields as they go along.

“You have to think about it commercially, how you are going to generate that funding and be able to do it. We are thinking how we can bring about a more lasting impression, and separate from process and structure, the facility is a key part of that as well,” Flow’s marketing guru explained.

He noted that the crux of the problem lies not with opening a good-quality field, but with being able to finance the upkeep of the playing surface.

“There is no doubt in my mind that schools want to get better playing facilities. But just like everything else the issue is money. The thing with fields is not putting them in, but it’s maintaining them.

“People have put in fields in this country, but if you go to those fields now they are cow pastures. What we are looking at — and when I speak to how ISSA needs to commercialise football — is that I think football is big enough to get enough support to fund itself plus [more]. I think that plus has to be structured partially into that development,” Redwood stressed, while encouraging other corporate sponsors to contribute to the development of youth football.

He hinted he is in the corner of those who balk at ISSA’s decision to host urban area Manning Cup second-round games and Walker Cup Knock-out fixtures at Constant Spring football field.

Constant Spring, said to be one of the more affordable neutral venues in the corporate area, has for many years hosted these schoolboy matches.

But fans, coaches, match officials, sponsors’ representatives and media personnel have often been left short changed by the unsuitable playing surfaces and other inadequacies at the facility.

Gaining shelter from the elements, taking into consideration that the competition is staged during the heart of the traditional rainy season in Jamaica, is a perennial struggle.

ISSA’s defence has usually centred on the challenge of affording other venues which are believed to offer superior facilities.

The Flow marketing boss said measures have been put in place to provide ISSA with viable options for the 2017 season which is scheduled to begin this Saturday, September 9.

“We know of the issue. There will be a budget for these games to be played at a proper venue, and therefore the argument around whether money is there or not is all a fact of planning and allocation of funds. The sponsors are all on board in supporting ISSA,” Redwood told the Sport Club.