Pre-Subroto match flouts FIFA rules

A Football match with new set of rules was played today during the Pre-Subroto Tournament at the Government Model Senior Secondary School,Sector 22,Chandigarh.

A Football match with new set of rules was played today during the Pre-Subroto Tournament at the Government Model Senior Secondary School,Sector 22,Chandigarh. Not following the FIFA guidelines which states that three referees should be fielded during a match,only two referees were seen officiating during the proceedings.

FIFA makes it mandatory that three referees officiate during a match- one referee and two assistant referees,called as linesmen. What more,the only assistant referee presence on the field,did not even have a flag to wave through which he makes his decision. “That was completely wrong. Pre-Subroto is not a small tournament. FIFA guidelines should be strictly followed,” said one of the coaches.

If this was not enough,the referees were not in their uniforms which are necessary. They were not even in track-suits; instead they were in their casual clothes. “This is against the spirit of the game. It’s sad to know that this happened. But we have no other option as UT Administration is not supporting us. We conducted several workshops and tests for referees in the past but no one turned up. As far as I know there are no qualified referees in Chandigarh schools. But you should contact director sports ML Sharma and ask him for yourself,” said Rakesh Bakshi,Chandigarh Football Association,the organiser of the tournament. Three matches were played today at the same ground.

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ML Sharma,Director Sports of UT Sports Department,when contacted,said,”Who says we don’t have qualified referees? CFA never sought our help. If they had asked for referees then we would have provided to them.”

One of the questions on that was in everyone’s mind was why was the tournament being played in a school premises when the UT Administration has a superb ground in the form of Sector 17 Football stadium? “Perhaps CFA was satisfied with the facilities that we provided to them. They did not ask us to provide them the Sector 17 Stadium,” said Sharma.

At a time when we say that Chandigarh football is making rapid improvements,incidents like these highlight that there are still much more steps to be taken to take football in the right direction. Whether it is the tussle between the UT Sports Department and Chandigarh Football Association,one thing is sure that Chandigarh football is suffering,but not the officials.

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