The Super League Football Tournament for both professionals and amateur players will kick-off next month at the Sugathadasa Stadium in Colombo.
The architect behind the concept of this event, Sports Minister, Namal Rajapaksa spoke to the participating 10 clubs and their representatives online with the Football Federation officials including the President and the General Secretary along with Dr. Lal Ekanayake from the Sports Medicine Unit over Zoom technology yesterday.
The Minister of Sports said: “It is very important to resume a professional competition structure in the country, if we are to strengthen our national football team and improve its world ranking. Hence, the Super League is the right start for this purpose.”
The FFSL is planning to launch the Super League on February 2 with the official media briefing followed by the preparatory games titled ‘pre-season’ from February 17 to March 7.
Each team will play four games against their rival teams under closed doors and adhering to strict health guidelines. This will enable the players to gain the all-important match practice, which they were deprived of with the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic for almost a year.
The original season of the Super League will commence on April 18 and is scheduled to be completed by end of July, in nine stages with 45 games in the league.
The Sports Minister also elaborated his plans of conducting another tournament which will be based on city-commercial franchise event involving six cities by the end of this year.
He also explaind the importance of setting-up a professional body with a governing council to maintain transparency, professional level administration and the implementation of competition regulations impartially.
This set up will be discussed with the FFSL and the National Sports Council to legalised with a proper framework.
