Kingston, Ont. teams busy in anticipation as recreational sports allowed to return on June 30th

If you’ve been waiting to enroll your kids in a sports league during the COVID-19 pandemic, or join one yourself, you’ll soon be able to get your kicks. Team sports are allowed to re-start when Ontario moves into Step 2 of its reopening plan on Wednesday.

For many, it’s been a long time coming, recreational team sports will be allowed to take on the field again as of June 30th.

“People are just happy to be out again and they’re happy to see their kids on the field and doing something different, not doing Zoom anymore and stuff like that. So it’s very exciting” says Andrea Austen, General Manager of Kingston United Soccer Club.

The return to play means organizing committees are busy making sure everything is in order and ready in time for next week.

General Manager Andrea Austen explains, “It’s a bit of a scramble that way because now that we know that we can play games and there’s no restrictions on group sizing then we can put all the teams together for the recreational programming. And then from there let the families know.”

It’s not just youth sports leagues that are eager to start another season. Adult leagues, like the Kingston Sports and Social Club, are also gearing up for an exciting summer to come.

“We have about 200 teams that are registered to play right for our summer season now across all our sports, and that is about half our capacity of what we normally do compared to maybe our 2019 numbers,” says Kingston Sports and Social Club director of program operations Matt Linton.

“But those who are excited to play are back to it and are really eager and optimistic about getting back to the sport.”

2:12 Most of Ontario to enter into Stage 2 of reopening next week