Greetings to all
It is my pleasure to welcome you all to the 2020 Vodafone Women’s Inter District Championship at ANZ Stadium in Suva.
The Women’s Inter District Championship has its own history which began in 2001. From then on it has been played every year except for 2007 and then in 2016 to 2018. We’re grateful to have revived the tournament last year and we are very much thankful to our sponsors Vodafone Fiji who has contributed massively in the development of football in Fiji.
On behalf of the Fiji Football family I would like to thank Vodafone Fiji for their continued support. Without the support of Vodafone this would not have been possible and I heartily thank Vodafone Fiji for making this happen.
Initially, we had scheduled the tournament to be played alongside the men’s Courts IDC but due to unplayable ground condition we were forced to postponed the tournament.
Nevertheless Fiji Football has been doing its part by actively promoting the development of women’s football. The potential for women’s football is limitless and, with this in mind, Fiji FA has taken the step of ensuring the funding isavailable to the women’s teams across the country for the future.
The association is already looking ahead, with a programme in place to ensure a strong women’s national team will compete in future Oceania tournaments.We are proud to say that we now have a strategic plan developed for 2020-2023 for the women football.
With our re-structured programmes of the Vodafone under 16 girls’ league, the Vodafone under 19 girls, senior women’s, it is paying dividends and this was evident with our national women’s teams performance during the OFC Nations Cup last year.
Certainly, women’s football has never been in a stronger position. We are currently ranked 65 in the world and third in the Oceania behind New Zealand and Papua New Guinea which is something very good.
Fiji FA will go into an overdrive to ensure that our girls are well prepared in the next two years, to be able to compete in Oceania and qualify for the first ever FIFA World Cup.
I wish the very best to the eight teams competing in this year’s tournament and hope true sportsmanship prevails in the game. Thank you to the sponsors, coaches, officials,families,players and fans who have made this year’s IDC possible.Good luck to our competitors, may the best team win|
Thank You.
Fiji FA president
Rajesh Patel
