Noman stars in Lyari Academy victory in Leisure Leagues KYI Football

KARACHI: Mohammad Noman netted four goals as Lyari Academy thumped Nabi Bux FC 4-0 during their Leisure Leagues Karachi Youth Initiative Football Tournament matches here at Lyari’s Gabol Park Football Ground the other day.

The Leisure Leagues Karachi Youth Initiative exploded into action with eighty matches played at four venues — namely 16-Star Football Ground (District Central), Ansar Union Football Stadium (District East), Mohammadi Stadium (District Malir) and Khyber-Muslim Football Stadium (District West).

Another 20 matches of District South were played on Sunday at Lyari’s Gabol Park Football Ground.Twenty teams are divided into two groups — Group A and Group B and are playing two matches against one another — on home and away basis against other teams in their respective groups. According to Leisure Leagues rule book, a league cannot have more than ten teams. Therefore, the twenty teams playing at one venue have been divided into two groups of ten teams each.

After beating Nabi Bux FC by 4-0 score as away team, Lyari Academy were held by the same team to a 0-0 tie when they played as home team.Apart from Group B’s Lyari Academy at Gabol Park, Lyari Youth FC in Group A also recorded a convincing 3-0 victory against Moosa Laghari FC as home team. Mohammad Yasir scored twice while Mohammad Amir scored one goal for winning team. Earlier, when Lyari Youth FC were away team and Moosa Laghari FC were home team, the match ended in a 0-0 draw.

In a Group B match, Noor Aalam sent the ball into the nets three times to help Master Yar Mohammad FC beat Sattar FC by 3-1 as away team. Later Aalam scored one more goal as his team beat Sattar FC again by 2-0 score as home team. Shahjahan scored the other goal.

A total of 100 teams — twenty teams each from Districts South, Central, East, Malir and West are participating in the mega tournament. The twenty teams of a district have been divided into two groups — Group ‘A’ and Group ‘B’. Each team in a group will play 18 matches, two matches against every other team in the Group.

Top teams from Group ‘A’ and Group ‘B’ will play the District final. The champions from the five districts will play in a ‘Champions League’, playing one match against each other. The top team from the league will become ‘Leisure Leagues Karachi Champions’.

Leisure Leagues is holding its events in Lahore, Islamabad, Hyderabad, Peshawar, Mardan, Quetta and Rawalpindi.

Jacobabad and Gilgit are next in line. Leisure Leagues is looking forward to enhance their presence in more cities in near future.The city champions of Leisure Leagues will play in Leisure Leagues National Tournament, likely in March 2018.