Schema question

Hello

I am not sure whether this is the right list for my question. Since you are
all XML gurus I ask it anyway ;-)

I am using SAXON 9.7.0.19 with Oxygen 19.1. and have the following schema that
finally does its job

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<xs:schema xmlns:xs="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema"
elementFormDefault="qualified"
  targetNamespace="http://contestants <http://contestants/>.com"
xmlns="http://contestants <http://contestants/>.com"
  xmlns:cont="http://contestants <http://contestants/>.com"
  version="1.1">
  <xs:element name="contestants">
    <xs:complexType>
      <xs:sequence>
        <xs:element minOccurs="16" maxOccurs="16" ref="contestant"/>
      </xs:sequence>
      <xs:assert test="every $cont in cont:contestant[position() lt last()]
satisfies
                      $cont/@seed lt
$cont/following-sibling::cont:contestant[1]/@seed"/>
    </xs:complexType>
  </xs:element>
  <xs:element name="contestant">
    <xs:complexType>
      <xs:simpleContent>
        <xs:extension base="xs:string">
          <xs:attribute name="seed" use="required"
type="xs:positiveInteger"/>
        </xs:extension>
      </xs:simpleContent>
    </xs:complexType>
  </xs:element>
</xs:schema>

I wrote the assert without the namespace prefix cont: which did not work. Any
explication way I need to prefix here even though the default namespace is the
same namespace and I can reference to an element without prefixing.

Thanks in advance
Leo