Necessary football facilities don’t exist: Players

KABUL (Pajhwok): Some football players have complained about the non-availability of sports facilities and standard playgrounds in most of the provinces while the Afghanistan Football Federation (AFF) promised the issue would be addressed.

Pajhwok Afghan News interviewed several football players across the country to know their viewpoints pertaining to the issue.

A football player Mohammad Ismael from the Kunar’s Sarkanoo told Pajhwok that he has been playing football for 15 years and he was a fan of this sport.

Ismael said: “Unfortunately we have neither football playgrounds nor other suitable locations for such sports.”

He asked AFF officials  to build a football ground in Kunar province that meet the required standards.

Ibrahim, a football player from Badghis province, shared a similar complaint related to the football ground and shortage of other facilities.

“We do not have a standard football playground, we play this game on a dusty ground, instead of being healthy, the sport makes us ill,” he said.

He has also asked from the AFF officials to build a standard football ground for them.

Aminullah, another football player from northeastern Badakhshan province, said, there is only one football playground in the capital city of Faizabad,

He asked the officials of AFF to build a standard football playground from artificial grass (chem-grass).

Muhabbat, another football payer of northern Samangan province has also raised his voice for a standard playground, he said the lawn on their playground was nice and green in the past but it dried up and now the ground was merely a dusty place.

Muhabbat said: “Dust rises from our playground when we play there, it creates health issues for us.” He has also called on the AFF to build a standard football ground for them.

Zahir, a football player of western Ghor province said, the officials had already started building a football ground in that province, but now all of its works are left half completed. He urged the AFF officials to complete the remaining work of their football playground.

Naveed Ahmad Gull of eastern Laghman province has been playing football for the past ten years. In comments with Pajhwok, he said they had no standard football playground in Laghman, the department of agriculture department allows some of the games to be played in Siraj Garden but the local officials do not allow other players to play their games in that Garden.

Gull urged the AFF officials to build a standard playground in Laghman.

AFF Director Jamshid Rahimi admitted to Pajhwok Afghan News that there was no football playground in Laghman but said the local football players played in a corner of Siraj Garden every day.

There are 50 active football teams in Laghman and a number of the athletes from these teams found their way to the national football squad of the country. Although the officials knocked on every door for their rights in this regard, so far their demands remained unanswered, Rahimi said.

AFF chairman Mohammad Yousuf Kargar said that their efforts were ongoing to build football grounds in provinces that lack such facilities.

At the first step, the federation needs to train more professional coaches in provinces where the game remained un-promoted and then build standard playgrounds, Kargar explained.

The federation had no budget for building playgrounds across the country, but FIFA had a plan to give AFF development projects in the upcoming two or three years so the federation would be able to spend its money on such projects, Kargar added.

“The number of FIFA’s development projects depends on the improvement of football sport in every country; FIFA assesses the development of football every two or three years in a country and then decides about development project.” Kargar added.

When Afghanistan won the South Asian Football Championship title of 2013, then FIFA found out that the football game had improved in Afghanistan and granted funds for some of its development projects in some provinces.

Regarding the provision of funds for provinces, he added every province needs to have a minimum of ten football clubs and a standard playground then it is entitled to get funds from AFF.

Due to the non-availability of standard football playgrounds, Afghanistan cannot host international football matches, to cover this need it holds its hosted matches in some foreign countries.

Aw/nh

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