Courtesy: Solomon Star News - SIFF MEDIA


Futsal Champ next week

Thursday, 25 March 2010

The first ever Futsal Championship in the country is set to kick off next week.

This was confirmed by the Solomon Islands Football Federation (SIFF) Events and Competition department yesterday.

SIFF Events and Competition manager, Daniel Fa’alimae Jnr said that the competition matches will start on Tuesday 30th March.

Honiara will be the host for the historic tournament.

The competition venue is yet to be confirmed but the matches will be played on grass, so Lawson Tama and SIFF academy field are likely to be used.

All competition matches will be played in the afternoon from 3pm each day.

Coaching sessions are planned for the team coaches during mornings.

The finals are expected to be played on Saturday 3rd April.

So far three Provincial Football Associations have confirmed their participation in the national futsal championship.

They will be sending two team each so a total of six teams will be coming from the provinces. SIFF is also inviting the four finalist of the Honiara men’s open futsal league to in 2009 to participate in the tournament. This will bring the total number of participating teams to ten.

Registrations for the futsal championship are now closed.

The championship was scheduled in the SIFF Events Calendar which was released in December, 2009.

Along with the national beach soccer championship dated for late April, the national futsal championship is the other newly introduced competition in 2010.

All these championships are part of a busy year for SIFF with a total of six national competitions being lined up for 2010.

This year will also see the start of SIFF National Soccer League (NSL).

The kick off date for the national soccer league is in October.

In 2009,SIFF successfully hosted the High School National Championship and the kid football, cultural exchange and education festival.

Both this event will be held again this year.

Futsal was introduced in the Solomon Islands in 1998. A period of six years had lapsed before the first national team was formed in 2004. Futsal has grown rapidly in popularity since and with success of the national futsal team and players like Elliot Ragomo and Jack Wetney who are regional stars in the 5-aside code.

The national futsal team will be participating in the Oceania Football Confederation (OFC) Futsal Championship in Fiji in July.

Solomon Islands is the current OFC Futsal Champions.


Posted by Luca Ranocchiari --> luca.ranocchiari@futsalplanet.com