School sport is back in South Australia after months of coronavirus restrictions
Schoolkids can get off the couch and into the park – sport is back! See who’s playing and where in our searchable calendar of public school sport events for the next six months.
SA News
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Let the games begin – competitive school sport is back.
“It feels good to be active again,” said footballer Skye Staines from Adelaide Botanic High.
“I was starting to feel unfit.
“Being back on the field with teammates feels great.”
All the school sport leagues will be back in business, most with shortened seasons, as a result of South Australia’s success in restricting coronavirus.
Nik Roelofs said he was really excited to be able get on the pitch and play soccer again.
“It was really boring without it,” he said.
The Sports Association for Adelaide Schools kicks off with soccer and junior hockey on Wednesday while School Sport SA will begin with table tennis finals next week.
Catholic secondary girls will be playing netball, soccer and badminton on Saturday while Catholic primary schools will start the term’s contest with netball next week.
The SA Christian Schools Sports Association starts with football next week.
“It’s been a long wait,” said Leo Panzarino of the Sports Association for Adelaide Schools.
“Everyone’s really excited, they were training hard in the lead up to the holiday break.”
School Sport SA, which runs the statewide competitions, will run intensive competitions.
“We are starting slowly with smaller numbers like the table tennis,” said team leader Paula Nielsen.
“Then we’ve got some really huge events coming up where there’s lots of rounds to get through.
“Instead of 20 weeks, we’ve only got 10 — so we’ll have groups of schools playing together, so instead of two schools playing against each other we’ll have groups of four or more playing and sorting through to get someone to move on.”
Ms Nielsen said the resumption was particularly important in regional areas where many club leagues had cancelled the entire season.
School Sport SA has been running virtual events during the forced break from competition.
This included a cross-country which was an extraordinary success.
“For our normal cross-country, they’ve got to come from wherever they are down to Adelaide and we get about 2500,” Ms Nielsen said.
“But doing it this way we had about 13,000.”
Education Minister John Gardner said SA’s proud record in tackling COVID-19 had paved the way for the return of sport and other activities.
“Students and families alike will be keen to get back into sport, which is fantastic because we know that physical activity provides immense benefits in supporting young people health and wellbeing,” he said.
“We know that the health and social benefits that comes with participating in sport are important for our young people, and I’m sure that school students across South Australia will be excited about returning to competition this term.
“The return of schools formals, socials, camps and excursions will certainly be welcomed by students, who earlier in the year may have feared these activities may not occur in 2020.”