Kunnamkulam: Will Palakkad district be able to become champions at the Kerala State School Sports Meet for the third consecutive year? Or will the Malappuram district - the new powerhouse in sports in the state, defeat the odds and rise to the top? Or will the other districts reign supreme at the meet? We will have to wait and see. The 65th Kerala State School Sports Meet will kick off today in Kunnamkulam.

The participants had trained at the newly laid synthetic track at the Kunnamkulam GVHSS on Monday. The state school sports meet is being conducted in Thrissur after a gap of 15 years. The first event at the meet is the 3,000 metres race for junior girls. The competition will kick off at 7 AM today. Medal winners in 21 events will be decided on the first day of the meet.

Over four days, 2,680 students will compete across 98 events at the meet. This year, the districts of Kozhikode, Kottayam and Ernakulam will pose a major threat to the strong teams from Palakkad and Malappuram. It should be noted that Ernakulam had successfully defended their title for over years starting from 2004. It is only in 2019 that they handed over the trophy to a different team, becoming the runners up in that particular year. However, in the last meet, they were pushed to the fifth spot, a dismal performance compared to their previous years. 

But Ernakulam will try to reestablish dominance at the meet this year, bringing in freshly recruited sporting talents from the district to the meet. The Kottayam team is also determined to put up a solid performance at the meet. In last year’s meet held in Thiruvananthapuram, Kozhikode had finished third, closely followed by Kottayam district.

The meet will be inaugurated by Minister V Sivankutty at 3:30 PM on Tuesday.