As the dust settles from last season’s Division 2 ISST victory, the Varsity Football team has finally been able to take back their rightful place among the other Division 1 (D1) teams. The team will be facing more experienced and skilled teams on the road to an ISST D1 victory.
Last Saturday the team looked ready for the upcoming season with an astounding 5-0 win against Inter-Community School Zürich (ICS). Now, with cuts made and a finalized team, they’re expecting an even more organized and powerful play style in their upcoming games.
This promotion to D1 comes almost six years after an incident occurred wherein disciplinary actions were taken against the team that disallowed them from playing in ISSTs, resulting in an automatic relegation. Six years of near-promotions followed as the team struggled to regain their spot in Division 1. However, many players are confident with this year’s team.
“Our squad, with our coach, has the potential to not only stay in Division 1 but to win it all,” says center back Karim El-Zawahry. While official captains haven’t been decided yet, Karim seems confident that center back Alexandros Kalkanis and center midfielder Samuel Reza would make great captains.
Both potential captains were happy to speak about the shape of the team.
“We’ve got an exciting team, young players, everyone seems ready to work hard and do well in Division 1. We’re all eager to start playing” says Alexandros. Sam quickly added his take: “We have a good team with a lot of pace; we’re lacking some physicality that we had last year but make up for it with some new, fast and technical players.”
With a young, hungry team and a shot for the D1 championship, this years varsity team has something to prove and from the looks of it, they’re going to deliver.