By S. Siapha Mulbah
One of Liberia’s promising youth coaches in Monrovia, Alieu Ousman Sesay, is calling on the Liberia Football Association to address the issue of the wide age gap currently among players of the lower football leagues across the country.
According to Sesay, the lower leagues consisting of the third, fourth and mass leagues need the football house to come up with policies that eradicate the issues of adults participating against younger players who are determined to advance their personal careers and make a name for their different clubs in the grassroot football sector.
Appearing as a guest to local radio sports talk-show over the weekend the License ‘C’ coach who is currently in charge of the Clay Street Community team in the Momo Community League and head coach of Devine Football Club in the Liberia Football Association Fourth Division league outlined several critical risks in having young players that should be considered for academic football league matches against players in the range of adults for points.
He recommended that the Liberia Football Association develop a policy that will make the youth players comfortable playing among themselves in the grassroot space rather than allowing them to put themselves into a dangerous race of competition against players that are far older than them.
Coach Tikitaka being his most common name called by the lads under his supervision and others in the community also explained that injuries in the grassroot program at times comes from talented youth players under the ages of 13-19 displaying their exceptional skills against some of those that are older than them in age.
“The football Association needs to put some mechanism in place for our grassroot program so that the young players we are nurturing can actually put that which is in them out at the third and fourth division along with the community league. The age gap is a big problem to our young teams participating in the grassroot sector,” he disclosed.
He further said, “As low as the mass league is for which we consider it as a pure grassroot and youth league, we still have players that are some years way above their 30s playing against the kids in their teens. We see it as a challenge and the competition department of the LFA have to look in the direction of ending this old age problem in our lower league and save the football future of Liberia.”
Alieu Sesay also called on clubs involved in some issues of age fixing of players that are prospected to lead the playing pitches in the nearest future to avoid embarrassing Liberia in the future during cases that the same players will have to make representation internationally and be denied.
According to him, as a grassroot coach for many years, it has been observed that some clubs for some unknown reasons reduce the ages of some of their players, registering them in the different leagues and having them play at some level that the national youth team will call for their services.
“As youth coaches and youth clubs’ administrators, let use put in the real data and ages of our players in the FIFA Connect system in order to have our players fitting in their actual frame to make the game grow so that the impact we have on their lives can be seen and not to embarrass the country when they are banned for age cheating,” Coach Tikitaka advised.
