Indonesian soccer body to start league on March 22

Indonesian soccer body to start league on March 22

JAKARTA (JP): The All Indonesian Soccer Federation meeting
decided on Thursday to delay the fourth Indonesian soccer league,
which originally started on Feb. 8, to March 22.

The meeting -- which was attended by the State Minister of
Youth Affairs and Sports Hayono Isman, the federation chairman
Azwar Anas, the federation branches chairmen and owners of the
clubs -- also allowed all clubs to find their own sponsors for
the league.

The decisions were taken as the best solutions to continue the
league during the economic turmoil in the country.

Azwar, who is also Coordinating Minister for People's Welfare,
said that the government also urged the federation not to stage
the league, which can cause riots, during the People's
Consultative Assembly's meeting from March 1 to March 11.

Hayono supported the call saying: "The federation and clubs
have more time to solve their problems on finding new sponsors."

The meeting's results also said that promoter PT Cipta Citra
had no longer contract with the federation to stage the league.

For this year's competition, each club can find its own
sponsors.

"But the federation still has the TV rights," the federation's
spokesman Tondo Widodo said.

Most of the meeting participants agreed to continue the
competition despite the economic turmoil.

Some clubs, including Balikpapan-based Persiba in East
Kalimantan and Manado-based Persema in North Sulawesi, suggested
the federation to only stage one season of the two-season
competition.

But the meeting resulted to go on with the full competition.

The federation's secretary-general, Nugraha Besoes, said clubs
had to be able to finance themselves during the competition.

"Otherwise, they won't survive until the final stages," he
said.

The final stages, which will be participated by the best 12
clubs at the Senayan main stadium, will not use the round-robin
system anymore but the knock-out system due to the limited time.

The league director, Iswadi Idris, told Antara that with the
new system, the competition would likely finish in July.

"Without the new system, we predict the competition will
finish by the end of August. We know that early September, we'll
stage the second ASEAN Tiger Cup and our national players must
perform at the championship," he said.

In August, the Winners Cup and the Asian Champion competitions
will start and the federation will have to send the teams to
compete at both tournaments.

The Bandung-based Persib manager, Dwi Kurnianto, and the
Surabaya-based Persebaya manager, Karwoto, expressed their
optimism that their clubs would survive during the league
although they would not receive Rp 100 million (US$10,000)
subsidy from the main sponsor.

On the other hand, the Denpasar-based Gelora Dewata manager,
Vigit Waluyo, was pessimistic on finding new sponsors during the
economic collapse.

"It depends on the club owner now to finance the club," he
said, adding that his club would still compete at the competition
as long as it has the money. (yan)