Gambia Minifootball Association targets Nations Cup birth after launch 

By Momodou Jarju

The executive of the newly formed Gambia Minifootball Association (GMA) has set their sight on qualifying the country to its first continental competition after launching the association last Saturday at the President’s International Award (PIA) in Bakau. The event saw the participants adopt the Gambia Minifootball Association Statutes after deliberations presented by Gambian football administrator and leader of Team Restore Confidence (TRC) Sadibou Kamaso.

Kamaso was appointed by Africa Minifootball Confederation (AMC) as president-designate last month to facilitate the establishment of the aforesaid association among other things in six months. He has been nominated as president of the association alongside other members for a one-year mandate to lead the process of setting up mini-football in the country.

The interim executive includes Sadibou Kamaso as President, Dodou Jomh as 1stVice President, Emad Trad as 2nd Vice President and the following are members: Essa Joof, Aja Kaddy Jaiteh, Jarra Sanneh, Andrew Jarju, Omar Jassey and Commissioner Ansumana Kinteh. The executive constitutes individuals from Banjul, Kanifing, and West Coast regions which forms part of the new association’s short-term and long-term plans to institute regional associations to expand the sport across the country.

Nations Cup Guinea 2027

One of Kamaso-led executive immediate priorities is to organise a mini-football tournament next month where they would select players for The Gambia national team to partake in the AMC African Mini football Nations Cup Guinea 2027, scheduled to take place from January 7 to 24, 2027.

Speaking at the event, Kamaso said mini-football isn’t well known in The Gambia yet but hopes to create more sustainable mechanisms to get people involved. The sports administrator said mini-football has been played in the Gambia, but it’s not structured and their aim is to elevate the spot in the country despite it being non-professional football.

“While FIFA is a very professional sport, which has been here for a very long time, mini football is yet to become professional. When we say professional, what we mean is a sport where what you earn is more than what you spend as a footballer. I spoke to some people like Ziko [Modou Ceesay, former Scorpions international], who played international football, and he tells me some of his former teammates are now playing mini football in their country, because it’s very advanced,” Kamaso said.

Currently, Kamaso went on, there are about 34 countries in Africa that are registered as members of the Africa Minifootball Confederation. “I think they have 14 more who are on the line, like the Gambia, who should be registered to make it about 48. Hopefully all these teams can go to the next [tournament] in Guinea,” he added.

Kamaso also said a lot of the pitches in the country do not meet the standard, which is why work has already begun in terms of establishing pitches with 3D quality.

“Mini football starts from 5, 6, 7 up to 8-a-side, but the normal standard that they play internationally is 6-a-side. You’ll get to realise that the rules and regulations even require you to drop one person if the match is nil up to maybe 10 minutes before the game or 5 minutes. So there are a lot of things that we need to learn from mini football,” he explained.

Speaking further, Kamaso said the African Mini-Football Confederation under the leadership of President Ben Ashraf Sakhla of Tunisia hopes The Gambia are able to have a team to participate at the tournament in Guinea.

“And I have been told what the conditions are. The Gambia just needs to register by paying $4,000 to have a team of 22 individuals, 15 players and [7] officials. The $4,000 as I am told does not include air travels. You find your way there. But that includes hotel accommodation, feeding, participation and everything for all the team that is there. So the idea is we establish this and hopefully we are able to play a tournament in November. Have a technical team who can do the assessment. Hopefully we are able to put up a team that plays in January.

“If we are not able to put up a team, we will still proceed with mini-football in The Gambia. So we need everybody to be able to participate. The other thing is for us to be able to become a national sporting organisation we need to have regional mini-football associations in at least three regions to register with the National Sports Council so we can benefit from what other sporting associations and federations are benefiting from.

“And that means Banjul, KM, West Coast and the rest of the regions, LRR, CRR, URR and NBR should be able to have their own mini-football associations. And if we go through the statute which is the constitution, you realise that the presidents of those regions would automatically become members of the board. So what we are going to do today is to present the statutes.

“And then the Regional Football Association, Mini-Football Association heads would be automatic members of the executive. And the executive is in a position to co-opt three people based on their technical competence to be able to steer the affairs of mini-football,” the GMA President further explained.

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Best Regards,

Momodou Jarju.