Wednesday Oct 22, 2025
Wednesday Oct 22, 2025
Saturday, 11 October 2025 01:03 - - {{hitsCtrl.values.hits}}
From left: AICT Global CEO Naimah Rafequel, Chairman Mohammed Shoaib, FSL President Jaswer Umar, Manchester Soccer Academy Chairman/Head Coach George Augustine
By Althaf Nawaz
The Manchester Soccer Academy (MSA) will launch the Federation Cup 2025 for the Under-12 segment which will be played today and tomorrow at the Race Course Stadium commencing 9.00 a.m. onwards.
With the participation of 16 leading academies in the country, MSA – one of the prominent youth football academies in the country – has inducted teams from various cities, including a team from the North.
One of the unique features of this year’s event will be that some of the games will carry on until 9.00 p.m. under lights, and played under the slogan of “United by football and driven by Passion”. This flood light facility was granted by FSL incumbent President Jaswar Umar, who has been quite magnanimous to extend his support to play under lights.
Jaswar, who graced the occasion by launching the Cup, said that he is happy to see a prominent active academy in the game come forward to kick-off a tournament of this nature focusing on the under-12 segment, which is very rare.
“We are delighted to see an academy like MSA has come forward to host a tournament of this nature. This will enable us to attract more young kids to take up the game. The grassroots level football is a must if we want to develop the game to unearth talent to play for the country one day. We will extend our support to other academies who are well organised like MSA and capable to conduct their own tournaments in their region,” said Jaswar.
The 16 teams are slotted in 4 groups with the top two teams of each group qualifying for the quarterfinals. The four winners will lock horns in the semi-finals, which will produce the finalists and culminate in the grand finale under lights on Sunday.
Tournament groupings:
