SFA ‘A’ Division League brews further controversy

BIJOY GURUNG

Sikkim Boys boycott ‘A’ Division, says no energy left to fight inept referees & indifferent SFA

GANGTOK,: Debutants Sikkim Boys FC have bowed out the ‘A’ Division S-League after playing only two matches, saying that the club and their players do not have any energy left to fight with inept match referees and indifferent Sikkim Football Association (SFA) for its remaining 12 games.

“We are exhausted. We do not want to continue quarrelling with the match referees and SFA, and are boycotting the A Division S-League organised by the SFA. We will continue playing tournaments but this league, our club executives have decided to boycott. It does not look good for the game, the players and the club to have bitter disputes and heated arguments with the referees at every game. Out of the six matches played so far in the league, three matches could not be held fully due to poor referee decisions and inability of the SFA to resolve such issues from recurring. This league is only teaching indiscipline among the players,” said the Sikkim Boys executives in a media conference here on Monday.

Sikkim Boys FC had walked out of its second league match against Howlers FC Singtam on Sunday at Paljor Stadium to protest an alleged wrong decision by the match official which cost them a goal. The incident happened just before half-time, and the club was declared as having conceded the match by the SFA.

Maintaining that the club was a victim of erroneous decisions, Sikkim Boys executives contended that the ‘A Division’ league has seen a series of similar poor refereeing in the six games played till Sunday. 

“Another previous match could not also be completed and went unresolved and we saw how those clubs protested the following day (Sunday) causing the day’s matches to start late. The ultimate victims are the people who turn out to watch the ‘A’ Division matches as they are unsure whether the matches would be held or not. Games are started late due to previous issues, people have to wait for two hours for the match to start and when the match actually starts, it does not even last 30 minutes due to referee-related controversies.”

Sikkim Boys FC president Puspa Gurung, treasurer Balaram Pradhan, coach Kamal Bagdas, team captain Karma Bhutia and others were addressing the media. They stressed that the SFA insists on the clubs to have AIFF-licensed coaches but do not seek matching requirements for their referees, ultimately compromising the quality of match officials, leading to acrimonious results.

“The SFA has no interest in addressing the complaints of the clubs. Elsewhere we have conflicts and tussles among the players. Here we have players versus the referees, and clubs versus the SFA and this happens every year. There is already a huge hostility among the players and referees in the six games played so far and still there are 50 more matches left. We cannot even imagine how worse the situation would be by the time the league is completed and as such, we do not want to get drawn into further conflicts and boycott the league. There are other tournaments coming up within and outside Sikkim where our team will participate for the overall development of our players,” said the Sikkim Boys executives.

Sikkim Boys is a club formed in 2014 by ex-national players of Sikkim, some of whom have played professional football also.  The club mostly played in veterans’ tournaments but later set up a junior team which played in ‘C’ Division before progressing into ‘B’ Division and finally in ‘A’ Division this year.