China match to swap

Aug 13, 2015 - 12:39:07 |

Maldives national team players during a training session in National Football Stadium

Male’, MALDIVES – Football Association of Maldives has said that they are working on to swap the FIFA World Cup Qualifying home match against China on 8th September due to the damage to the pitch of National Football Stadium.

“We are sure that we can’t play the match against China on 8thSeptember in Male due to the damage to National Football Stadium pitch. Now we are in discussion with the Chinese FA to swap the match to China as their home match on 8thSeptember. And we will play our home match against China on 24thMarch 2016.” Normalization committee chairman Mohamed Shaweed said today.

“If they didn’t agree to swap these two matches the only option for us is to play this match in a neutral venue and we got confirmation from Qatar, Sri Lanka and Dubai to play this game.”

Shaweed also reiterated that still they are working hard to finalize it as they wanted to play such a match in Male’.

“We want to play this match here in Male’ as it would be a record breaking match for the Maldives from the sponsors and all. We have already sold the media rights of this match to a foreign party for USD 250,000 and this is a huge loss for us.”

Maldives is set to play against China on 8thSeptember in the 2018 FIFA World Cup Qualifier.

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horrible on Aug 13

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Shaweed, don’t we have a stadium good enough for the same in Addu City – FIFA sanctioned AFC challenge cup matches were played just last year? Why go through the hassles of finding a neutral ground? Or is a national team match in Addu a too-far-fetched idea to bring about?

Imma on Aug 13

Like 4

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What was the point of upgrading the Hithadhoo Stadium last year? It is definitely capable of hosting competitive international matches. Only war-torn countries play in neutral territories, which would be a disaster as we would be deprived of our home advantage against the strongest team in the group.

footballmad on Aug 14

Like 1

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Imma,yes, Addu would be a great opportunity for the long-term future but then from what we see, foresight and long-term planning is beyond the current decision-makers! It's a classic combination: unaware of the consequences for bad decisions and not realsing when opportunity knocks on the door; turning a bad situation into a real opporunity is a characteristics of real leaders.

footballmad on Aug 14

Like 2

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So, who's taking the blame for the financial loss? What about playing the match in Addu? Think outside the box!