BY JOHN HOUANIHAU
A major challenge often faced by Solomon Islands Football Federation over the years is dealing with players’ age eligibility requirements to play in organized youth football competitions, according to Solomon Islands Football Federation’s Telekom Super League’s Games Director, Gerald Oiaka.
He told Raw Sports that under Solomon Islands Football Federation (SIFF) requirements, it’s important to conduct age verification exercises to permit players to represent one club at this year’s Telekom Super League (TSL) U19 League.
“The U19 competition will feature a total of twelve TSL fringes clubs. However, the date for the competition is yet to be set due to the slow verification processing of the respective club’s individual players.
“There are several requirements that will determine whether a player is eligible or not based on age before representing a club in this year’s Telekom Super League (TSL) U19 League.
“We don’t want to repeat what had happened, past is history and therefore in order to move forward in our youth competitions. So, if you’re above 19 years old – there is a very small chance to play with a club this year’s youth football league of competition,” Oiaka said.
Telekom Super League’s Games Director, Gerald Oiaka said they are also working closely with the Ministry of Home and Affairs to help them with the verification process.
“One of the challenges we faced over the years was the verification of players in each participating team, especially when verification of age categories.
“I called on participating teams, especially the 12 TSL clubs to quickly lace close with us to complete the verification process so that we could have the players ready to be registered for the competition,” he urged.
The final date for all TSL U19 teams to submit their players’ age profiles is today – Friday 17 September – to kick off this year’s domestic youth league of competition, according to Telekom Super League’s Games Director, Gerald Oiaka.
The U19 league matches are scheduled at the DC Park Sports ground and should be played parallel with the TSL Senior League and is expected to end on the 21st November 2021.
