Local event overshadowed by Football World Cup


Ammar Haider June 24, 2010
While the whole country is busy admiring Messi’s magic, showing their depression over unfair sending off for Kaka, and worried about England’s hope of winning silverware, there are a few lads out there in People’s Stadium, Karachi representing their cities in Pakistan’s 2nd edition of Super Football League.  Teams from Karachi, Lahore, Peshawar, Islamabad and Quetta are fighting head to head, to win this years tournament.

I mentioned in a previous post, that the decision to organize this event right when World Cup fever was high was a wrong one and lacked planning to organize this event when World Cup fever is high. Although the competition is sponsored by a leading sports TV channel it seems that it was more like a commercial deal to boost their brand name, rather than having serious attitude towards football development in the country. There is hardly any coverage of this event in the electronic and print media, and not many people are aware of the tournament.

The organizers’ decision to choose People’s stadium as an official venue has also prevented a lot of fans from across the city to watch the matches, due to security concerns in the area. But one thing we have to keep in mind is that it is the only stadium with good facilities available in the city. PFF should use the funds provided by FIFA to build more international standard stadiums in order to draw crowds and fans alike.
WRITTEN BY:
Ammar Haider Ammar Haider works in the IT industry and has an interest in social issues related to the common Pakistani. He is passionate about football development in Pakistan. He tweets @ammar_haider. He blogs at White Sh@dow and Football de Pakistan.
The views expressed by the writer and the reader comments do not necassarily reflect the views and policies of the Express Tribune.

COMMENTS (3)

Abdul Hameed Kath | 13 years ago | Reply Good one Ammar and a thought provoking post. Good luck with PFF and wish that the development funds given by FIFA are properly and transparently utilized for this cause in Pakistan.
Patriot | 13 years ago | Reply come on brother...a channel not attempting to get the rights to bradcast fifa world cup ends up organizing a football league at the same timings as the world cup match...who would you expect to come??? The final of a low profile league in karachi recenetly ended up attracting 15000 people. its just the matter of timing sir!
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