Though it may be difficult to kick off outdoor sporting activities in the near future due to the COVID-19 pandemic, MSSA is planning to conduct its chess and carrom tournaments online. "Last season, over 1000 chess players from 178 schools and 411 carrom players from 81 schools were part of our competitions. We are hoping to get similar numbers in our online competitions for chess and carrom that are scheduled for October-November," said MSSA president, Fr Jude Rodrigues.

There is a plan for outdoor sports events too. "While 358 schools participated in our cricket competitions [across both Harris and Giles Shield tournaments] last season, this year we plan to feature only the top 16 teams for a short tournament in January-February 2021. Football is our most popular sport, and witnessed over 1000 teams last year [from the U-8 to U-16 age groups]. But here too, we can conduct a tournament only for the top 16 teams in two categories, U-14 and U-16. These plans are obviously subject to government permission," added Fr Jude.