“The problem was that the Oceania Football Confederation which had sanctioned the Pacific Games is a qualifying tournament for Oceania didn’t want to have a qualifying tournament with teams that weren’t eligible to qualify through Oceania and that included us and Guam both of which have entered sort of unexpectedly,” said NMASA President Michael during their monthly meeting at the Ada gym’s conference room.
“In Noumea the Pacific Games people agreed to defend our absolute right to enter the tournament if we wanted to do it. But the consequences would be the Oceania Football Confederation was threatening to pull out of their sponsorship with the tournament which would cause the organizing committee a lot of money,” explained White.
“We were begged to withdraw but at the same time we were told that we had an absolute right to enter the competition if we wanted to do that. NMIFA gracefully agreed that they didn’t want to upset anyone and that they wanted to respect the Oceania Football Confederation’s position in the matter and they agreed to withdraw,” White further stated.
As of press time last week it was still unknown if Guam will compete or withdraw as the Saipan teams did. “I want to commend NMIFA for their cooperation in this matter. They did the right thing,” said Micheal White.
Although NMIFA will not be competing in the quadrennial event they will not be penalized $1000 for not showing up. The Variety also learned that the Pacific Games council will amend the bylaws so that the conflict will not happen again in the future.
“Let me thank Mike for standing behind us and pushing for our right to participate. The board of NMIFA met and decided that it was best to withdraw because we were also facing other possible sanctions from AFC,” said NMIFA’s General Secretary Edward Salas.
Salas also said that he did not want to cause conflict with FIFA because it would create bigger problems for NMIFA. The Pacific games are scheduled to take place in Noumea, New Caledonia which will run from Aug. 27 to Sep. 10.
On the other hand, NMASA has confirmed that it will be sending Mike Mancao to compete in the 2011 University Games in Shinzen, China and the other competitor has yet to confirm entrance to the competition.
