Squad leaves for Buenos Aires on Friday
BY ROMULUS HUTA
SOLOMON Islands Football Federation (SIFF) has released the names of the national under-18 futsal squad members for next month’s Youth Olympic Games (YOG) in Argentina.
A total of 10 players were named last night.
This comes five days prior to departure for Buenos Aires Friday this week.
Amongst names in the final squad are Raphael Le’ai and Leon Kofana.
The duo was part of the side which helped Solomon Islands reached the finals of the recent OFC Under-16 Championship in Honiara and helped the country qualified for next year’s FIFA Under-17 World Cup in Peru in the process.
Le’ai and Kofana are key members of the young futsal side and so as the national under-16 soccer side.
The entire YOG will run from October 6 to 18. The futsal competition will begin on October.
Solomon Islands are in Group B of the men’s competition with Iran, Costa Rica, Russia and Brazil.
The junior Kurukurus previously had been confirmed to fly out on October 4 but saw their departure moved a week back amidst concerns over players suffering from jet lag.
“We need to leave a week early because Argentina is a long way, it will be a long and tiring flight for the boys.
“This is necessary because we have to allow and give the boys time to recover from the long journey for competitions which starts on October 7,” the team management said.
The Junior Kurukurus are expected to play two friendly matches in build up for the Olympics.
An international friendly match with Slovakia on October 4 is said to be one of the friendly matches awaiting the young Kurukurus on the other side.
Meet the members of the squad:
Lauwale Ata, Lordick Afia, Calwin Do’oro, Ronado Cromwell, Junior Mana (C), Travis Sau, Raphael Le’ai, Leon Kofana, Franskter Rukumana and William Tahairu
