I.League Evaluation: Disciplinary Issues Remain a Concern in the EPA
Jakarta (ANTARA) - The Director of I.League Competition, Asep Saputra, evaluated this season’s Elite Pro Academy (EPA) competition, stating that disciplinary violations remain relatively high.
The EPA competition concluded on Sunday at the Garudayaksa Football Academy field in Bekasi, culminating in a 1-0 victory for Persija Jakarta U20 in the EPA Super League U20 final against Malut United U20.
Prior to Persija U20’s victory, Persik Kediri won the EPA Super League U16 and Malut United emerged as champions in the EPA Super League U18. Earlier on Saturday, the EPA Championship U19 final was also held, with Sumsel United emerging victorious.
“I think this is still a major challenge for us, not only for the clubs but also for I.League, the officials, match officials, spectators and others to return to the original goal. At a young age, they must also be nurtured and guided on how to behave professionally, avoid violating sportsmanship and fair play, and hopefully it will be better in the coming seasons,” said Asep when met by media including ANTARA after the EPA Super League U20 final at the Garudayaksa field on Sunday.
The match was marred by a scuffle at the end of the game, involving Bhayangkara player Fadly Alberto Hengga, who also plays for the national U17 team, kicking Dewa United player Rakha Nurkholis in a kung-fu style. This incident initially sparked anger from both sides, before the two players involved agreed to shake hands and resolve the matter peacefully.
However, this incident still resulted in sanctions for the players involved from the PSSI Disciplinary Committee, including Alberto Hengga, who received a three-year ban.
When asked about I.League’s efforts to prevent such incidents from happening, Asep said that they have made many efforts, one of which is to impose strict sanctions.
On the same occasion, Asep also said that next season there will be no changes in the EPA Super League competition, which holds competitions for U16, U18, and U20 age groups. On the other hand, there will be an addition of age groups in the EPA Championship, which this season only featured the U19 age group.
He also hinted that next season the EPA competition may play a different format from this season, but it will still not reduce the competitive value of the competition itself.
“For example, mixing the format, there is a ‘round-robin’, it can be combined with ‘swiss’ for example, or also earlier ‘home and away’ combined with ‘centralized’ with series if for areas that are outside Java. Once again, 70 percent of it we are still working on, hopefully in the near future we will also share this information to all clubs,” he concluded.