Konofilia hits back on SIFF

OUTSPOKEN football critic Joel Moffat Konofilia has lashed out at the national football governing body stating the statement published last week to condemn his continuous social media ranting as merely ‘all excuses’.

The statement issued by Solomon Islands Football Federation (SIFF) last week termed Konofilia’s continuous scathing attacks on them in the social media as unprofessional.

This follows Konofilia’s recent request to borrow some money from SIFF to cater for him to send some members of his Royals Football Academy to undergo trials with clubs in United Kingdom.

Referring to the statement, SIFF said the manner in which Konofilia behaved whereby he asked to borrow some money from them to aid him send his academy youngsters to attend trial overseas was totally ‘unprofessional’ in a sense that they are not a lending institution.

SIFF asserted that under the FIFA regulations and statutes, SIFF is not obliged to enter into any dealings with Konofilia and Royal academy given they are not affiliated to Honiara Football Association (HFA) nor the Guadalcanal Football Association (GFA) which he claimed to be technically operating under.

“SIFF is entirely responsible for technical, infrastructure and administration of national leagues and only answerable to its member associations.

“However, due to Joel’s continuous visitation at the Allen Boso Complex, SIFF staff have had opened our doors to listen to him.

“Thus, SIFF has warned Joel to stop his misleading ranting against the national body but rather find a way to move the game we all love forward,” the statement explains.

In a response to SIFF, Konofilia said: “These are all excuses.

“The SIFF President William Lai and I already had a reconciliation and that’s why I was only asking for SIFF to help if they could.

“They responded by saying that SIFF has no budget for such activity.

“Then that’s when I asked if we could at least borrow some money and reimburse after our corporate dinner. This was just to meet deadlines.”

Maintaining its stand, SIFF said any project emerging with his (Konofilia) face on it may appear dubious, citing a previous incident last year where the national football governing body paid Australian Visa for two players who were supposed to have trials in Australia through a similar arrangement under Royals which was never carried out.

However, Konofilia lashes out to SIFF by admitting that his previous arrangement for trials in Australia did not eventuate because he was in prison during the whole of February last year.

“Secondly the trip to Aussie didn’t eventuate because I was in prison the whole of February and my partner in Australia thought that I wasn’t interested and cancelled the trip.

“With regards to the payment of the two boys’ visas, the money was never released from SIFF account as we never lodged the visa application in the end.

“However, I would like to stress here that what I’m doing is the best thing that has happen to Solo soccer and SIFF will definitely benefit in the end just like in the case of my nephew, Marcus Chan. Now SIFF needs his service for the upcoming World Cup Qualifiers.

“SIFF never helped his family in the initial stage to send him overseas to train but just look at what’s happening now, they are calling for his service,” Konofila expressed.

SIFF also called on Konofilia to provide them with informative details of the overseas trials but the former national midfielder refused to disclose them.

Details requested by SIFF includes confirmed correspondence from EPL clubs about the trials, contacts and other details which then will be forwarded to the executive members for consideration.

“With details of my agent, I am sorry but I deliberately kept it as secret. However, the trip is definitely on as I’ve already committed funds with the payment of two of our players.

“With regards to not disclosing my partner, it should be understandable because last time I disclosed ROYALS Sponsor, SIFF tried cutting that deal, and fortunately the sponsor was a foreigner and reported SIFF’s attempt to me,” Konofilia affirms.

Furthermore, Konofilia added that SIFF’s plan to send three boys to the Spanish La Liga for trials after the September qualifiers is just a cover up.

“And with regards to the 3 boys going for trials in the La Liga is just a cover up for SIFF’s sleepiness. They are just embarrassed as they are doing nothing for our top elites while Royals are thousand miles

ahead already.

“So while SIFF decides not to help my boys financially attend trials overseas, they still have plans to send players overseas, which only confirms to me that they have money but does not want to help me because it has to be them doing it and not me (Konofilia) for reason only known to themselves.”

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