The Coca-Cola Cup Inter-school Football Tournament is beginning here at the Dasharath Stadium with a grand opening ceremony on Thursday. 

The first phase of the tournament — which will be held in five different centres of the country — will be participated in by more than 500 school teams, the organisers, All Nepal Football Association (ANFA) informed here at a press meet today. 

The title sponsors of the tournament, which features competition in both the boys’ and girls’ sections, Bottlers Nepal Limited will provide ANFA with Rs 1.5 million, while the Youth and Sports Ministry have already allotted Rs 1.8 million. 

A total of 196 schools — 176 in boys and 20 in girls’ sections — will compete in the tournament in Kathmandu, while 45 teams of Western Region will take part in Butwal from July 17 and 94 teams in Pokhara from July 15. 

Likewise the tournament in Nepalgunj will kick off on July 17 featuring 44 teams from Mid-Western Region. The Far-Western Region tournament among 30 teams will be held from July 25, whereas the tournament in Eastern Region will be held in Biratnagar from July 16 with 102 school teams in fray. 

ANFA is yet to deicide the number of qualifiers from the regional tournaments for the final round, which will be held in league-cum-knockout basis. Top four teams in both the sections will receive Rs 200,000, Rs 100,000, Rs 50,000 and Rs 25,000 respectively. 

“From the next year, our member FAs will organise the tournaments in all districts before the regional tournaments and the final round,” said ANFA President and AFC Vice-president Ganesh Thapa. He also informed ANFA has almost finalised the homework of converting its academy into Coca-Cola ANFA Academy. 

“We are about to reach the agreement and we are thankful to Coca-Cola for their continued support,” he said. Managing Director of Bottlers Nepal Salman Latif said the objective of sponsoring the event was to produce quality players for future. 

“The kids, who compete in the Coca-Coca Cup, should play in national level tomorrow,” he said. “These players are the pride of ANFA and Coca-Cola and we should move ahead with this,” he added. 

Under-secretary at Youth and Sports Ministry Surya Prasad Sharma argued the amount allotted by the government was insufficient to hold such a tournament. “The amount is the government’s initiation to gear up for the tournament,” said Sharma. Meanwhile, ANFA announced the Coca-Cola Media Corporate Football Tournament from June 25 under the sponsorship of Bottlers Nepal Limited.