After an unfortunate turn of events Solid SC were denied their Quarter Final birth as they were deemed to have fielded an ineligible player against Air Force SC during their Pre-Quarter Final match played on the 8th of May at the Air Force Base, Ekala.
In that encounter after being down 1-0 at half time, Solid scored back to back goals within minutes of the restart and held on to win 2-1.
However, after the match the Air Force officials had lodged a protest at the Football Federation against Solid’s foreign player Afis Olayemi.
The inquiry regarding the matter was held on the 10th of May and it was revealed that Afis Olayemi had played without a valid VISA at the time of participation in the above match, thus becoming an ineligible player.
Hence the Competition Committee unanimously decided to award the match to Air Force SC.
On the flip side of this story, the player accused, Afis Olayemi, speaking to ThePapare.com claimed that he had taken measures to avoid this situation and that it was the ignorance of the relevant authorities that cost him and his side a shot at the FA Cup.
“The expiration date of my VISA was on the date of the match. I gave him (The President of Solid SC) my passport to renew 2 weeks before expiring date but he complained, I could have brought it earlier that the processing from Anuradhapura to Colombo will be little stressed for him.”[sic]
Afis emphasized how the holiday season came in the way of his visa process. He further mentioned,
“After collecting all data then Sri Lankan New Year came and there were holidays and everybody went for trips, when the holiday was over they took it to immigration but immigration gave them, another application. Since it got expired like a month before they came back and they gave the team appointment to come for the processing on Tuesday but the match was held on Sunday.” [sic]
However, the biggest talking point is that the match commissioner cleared the Nigerian on the day of game to play after inspecting the VISA. Afis inquired as to why it was made an issue and as to why the visa ended up in their opponents’ hands.
He stated “That is ridiculous, and the next thing was an excuse of me not having visa. This is totally unjustified because I was told to play by the match commissioner.” [sic]
Afis further expressed his displeasure regarding how players are being mistreated as professionals in Sri Lanka and how certain clubs are being favoured due to their history.
“I have seen some decisions made in this country when it comes to football that have never in my life seen before and if things continue this way and some team being favoured… it won’t help the country football and it won’t help the mentality of the Sri Lanka players and it will continue to affect the national team.” [sic]
Further he mentioned “We the foreign players haven’t been treated like professionals in this country, we all watched La Liga, Bundesliga and Seria A, English PL, even neighbours Maldives and India. They all treated foreigners like professional and even we are not getting help from the federation at all, players not giving salaries and players not getting their rights this is bad and the federation should do something about this we get racism abuse during matches etc.” [sic]
Undoubtedly the local standard of football has risen with the introduction of foreign players, nonetheless the professionalism in which they have been managed on and off the field has been questionable throughout the years.
Similar to Afis, many foreign players have faced mishaps during their stays and have nothing to positive carry away with them after their short stints in the island. If the situation prevails it will deter international players from considering Sri Lanka as a preferred destination and will subsequently damage the current footballing standard maintained in the country.
