2015 Sprite Ball diary: Schools arrive, head to 4 orphanages

The excitement and anticipation was palpable in the air at the Hilla Liman hostel on the University of Ghana Legon campus as the various teams participating in this year’s Sprite Ball tournament arrived.

As the players descended from their respective buses, they chanted their institutions “pump up” songs and started the trash talking. Of course, it will all get settled at the El Wak Sports stadium but the pregame “We are here to win” talk had to happen and the verbosely athletic young men and women did not fail in this regard.

All the schools quickly went through the check in formalities with some eager institutions having soft practices immediately after settling in.

A quick interview with the teams had most of the head coaches likening their team identity to the reigning NBA champions, the Spurs with the reasoning being the generic “our team is built around all players and not a single one”.

However, a select few coaches said their teams played like the Miami Heat and the Clippers.

After dinner was served and the teams were adequately fed, a short welcome address was delivered by the CEO of Rite Multimedia (the organizers of the tournament), Mr Yaw Sakyi.

He entreated all teams to be on the best of behaviours and went through the line-up of events for the tournament. The excitement was still in the air late into the hour as the schools gathered engaged in a “Who is the loudest” challenge.

The schools from the Western and Volta regions were arguably the noisiest and if loquaciousness determined the winner of the tournament, it would be safe to say the trophies would be heading to either Ho or Takoradi.

Thursday 9^th January will be an activity packed day for the teams as they head to the Teshie and Osu children’s homes as well as the Dzorwulu Special school and Remar international  for a donation visit.

This is being done with the hope of inculcating the spirit of giving back to society into these future leaders.

There will also be the Opening ceremony on TV3, today at 5:00 pm live. Stay glued to your sofa and keep the channel on TV3. You do not want to miss out on that!!!