Mandokhel Football tournament begins from Wednesday

KARACHI: All Pakistan Deputy Commissioner Jumadad Mandokhel Football tournament will begin at the Essa Khan Football Academy in Chaman with the qualifiers from Wednesday.

The qualifiers, which will be carrying 32 teams, will last until June 5. The main round will be held from June 6 to 25. In the final round, 16 clubs will feature which will be bracketed in four groups. The top two teams from each group will make it to the quarter-finals. Muslim FC, Afghan FC and PACA, three outfits from Afghanistan, and nine teams from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Sindh and Punjab, have been directly placed in the main event.

They will be joined by the Balochistan DFAs qualifying round champions. The chief organiser and former Pakistan captain Mohammad Essa told ‘The News’ from Quetta on Sunday that one club from Afghanistan has been put in the qualifiers which will be held on the basis of a knock-out system.

Essa said that the total prize money of the event is Rs500,000. “It’s not a big amount but I am trying to seek some more sponsors as players need support at this critical stage. You know there are no mainstream football activities so it’s important to keep the players engaged in the game,” Essa said.

Besides handling a quality academy at his hometown in Chaman, the country’s former fine playmaker has been consistently organising events at the national level. In the forthcoming event it is expected that some departmental teams would also travel to Chaman, a football-mad zone of Balochistan, which has produced quality players for national duty.