Labuan: Labuan Amateur Football Association (Lafa) face the grim prospect of being suspended from FAM for one or more years as a penalty for the fracas that erupted after the finals of "Piala Permuda Umno" at the Sport stadium last weekend.Lafa Chairman SK Tan said though they were not the organisers of the tournament they are technically responsible and would have to face the Football Association of Malaysia Disciplinary Committee.He said that he was in communication with the FAM committee and have been told that one or more officials would be coming to Labuan to look at the recordings and gather other facts.
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"We are leaving it to FAM to take whatever action. Though the brawl lasted only for a few minutes, it has been damaging."Twenty-seven teams took part in the biennial tournament and during the finals the stadium had about 43,000 spectators. Bebuloh Team met Patau Patu 2 Team in the finals and at full time the score stood at 1-1.
The match went into extended time and at final whistle the score stood at 3-2 in favour of Bebuloh.Tan said it was a nail-biting final and without any incident. However at the end of the match, according to some accounts, someone from the winning team went over to the losers bench and made some gestures or remarks and this was taken as provocation and a bottle of mineral water was thrown at him.
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The action sparked a commotion and developed into a brawl with flying chairs and objects."No one was hurt as security officers managed to quell the violence," said SK Tan.
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Member of Parliament Datuk Roznan Isli, who was present, earlier praised the teams for showing good sportsmanship throughout the competition and had left the stadium when the brawl occurred. He is upset."We had never expected this last minute episode would make the tournament ugly," said Tan.Rozman later returned and presented the winner RM10,000 cash prize and medals while the runner-up walked away with RM5,000.Tan said in the event of a suspension, Lafa would not be able to hold tournaments nor take part in FAM-sanctioned tournaments.
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"And we will be the big losers since Labuan are the defending champions of the Sabah CM's Cup and a participant of Liga Rakyat Malaysia. Our players may lose the opportunity to be selected to play for bigger clubs," said Tan.He added the players would be demoralised and development of local soccer would be affected. - Sohan Das
