_{Photo: Yabra Football Club U-17 – Belize District 2023-24 champions}

BELIZE CITY, Thurs. July 18, 2024

The Football Federation of Belize (FFB) needs to get things in order quickly or football in Belize could be headed for the “bad old days” again, where many fans stopped supporting the games in protest of the highly unpopular FFB administration a couple decades ago.

Some district agents of the FFB have previously used “technicalities” to bar certain long-standing football club managers from attending the congress of their district association when it was election time for the district branch executives, on the basis of some new requirements with the FIFA registration system, whereby their clubs were deemed ineligible.

So, the FFB is supposed to have appointed a salaried person to represent each district association and liaise with the FFB in the national tournaments. This was ostensibly to avoid any mix-up with all the new rules and technicalities which are being imposed with a FIFA Connect system for registration of football clubs.

Now, according to our sources, there is a sudden decision coming down from Belmopan, that the recently crowned undefeated Belize District U-17 male football champions, Yabra Football Club U-17, will not be allowed to participate in the FFB’s upcoming National Male U-17 Championship. The reason? Something about the timing of the Opening and Closing Season tournaments which the district association is supposed to have held. The participating clubs had nothing to do with those decisions. The kids have been preparing and are ready and eager to play. They played football and the tournament produced an undisputed champion.

We hope this mistake can be quickly corrected.

“Believe in the process!”