THE Fiji Football Association should take responsibility for the national soccer teams winless outing at the Oceania Football Cup in the Solomon Islands.
Former Lautoka soccer vice president Raymond Singh said the parent body must take the blame for the teams failure.
He said the Fiji FA concept of playing 60-minute soccer at local tournaments would never help the growth of the sport and was one of the contributing factors to the fall of the Fijians in the Solomon Islands.
This is all because of Fiji FAs sacrificing the national team for the so-called 60-minute game during the Fiji FACT, said Singh.
It is obvious by putting more priority to the 60-minute tournament, which is not recognised anywhere in the world, has been the cause of Fijis downfall.
Had the Fiji FA done their homework it would have been a different story altogether.
Fiji FA president Rajesh Patel said the initial plan was to have 90-minute soccer during the Fiji FACT but time was not on their side. Wet weather and other factors affected this plan, he said.
We wanted to start the local tournament with 90-minute but because of the bad weather conditions and lack of time we could not do so, he said.
Surely we will adopt the 90-minute during the BOG.
Raymond said another reason for the downfall was players lacking national pride.
The blame lies on Fiji FA as they knew too well that national commitment should have been a top priority but they allowed the players to compete at the Fiji FACT for their respective districts.
Look at rugby and other sporting bodies, more priority is placed on the national team rather than the domestic tournament.
Country comes first, then district, said Singh.
Fiji lost to New Zealand 0-1, drew with the Solomons 1-all and also drew with PNG 1-all.