The Fiji Football Association would be enforcing harsher penalties from next season against districts that does not comply with their club game requirements.
This was according to the Fiji FA Chief Executive Mohammed Yusuf as several district teams were not able to complete their league games by November 30, affecting the number of participating teams in the Digicel Fiji National Club Championship.
Yusuf said this would be addressed during the Fiji FA Council meeting on January 15 in Suva.
“We want all districts to fully comply which means they should have a league during the year where they’ll see their top club so, we will be emphasising this in our January Councill Meeting,” he said.
“After the first four rounds of the national league in February there will be a break for about a month because the national team will be preparing for March friendlies and as a result it will be compulsory for the districts to run their local league.
“If they fail then we are proposing that there should be some decisions made maybe they’ll lose points for the league. We want all the districts to run their local leagues and we have been harping about this for a long time and we want to change all that in 2024.”
Yusuf said they had planned the next season’s calendar accordingly.
“We’ll give them two weeks break in March up to Easter, May was two to three weeks break as well as for July, August, and September. These breaks will be for them to run their local leagues.
“We will conclude this season but by next year we want all districts to complete and nominate so we’ll have zonal play-offs and the top eight will come in to play the finals.”
The NCC starts today at the Fiji FA Academy ground in Vatuwaqa, Suva with two matches.
The first match is between Lami Rangers and Mega FC at 1pm while Classy FC and Nausori United wrap up day one at 3pm.
