Thu, 28 Oct, 2021
Kuala Lumpur: Participants attending a woman’s football workshop in the Malaysian capital are inspired by the good work the AFC, other confederations and other MAs are doing to develop the women’s game in their countries.
A three-day AFC Women’s Development Workshop was held from Thursday in the Malaysian capital of Kuala Lumpur attended by leaders of women’s football in AFC and its Member Associations.
Speakers from AFC, FIFA, UEFA and several AFC Member Associations made presentation during the workshop which also had work group, group presentations and panel discussion sessions.
One of the participants, Lebanon Football Association Women’s Committee Rana Nakhle, shared her sentiments with The-AFC.com.
“The workshop is really a great experience where we learned a lot of things,” she said. “Now we know more about the various support programmes from AFC and FIFA and we target to take part in all the programmes which suit us very well.
“It’s not impossible if we achieve success in Lebanon even greater than men’s football. There is a great potential among Lebanon girls but they don’t practise all year. Our plan is to improve this and who knows someday we will be standing alongside Jordan in the AFC Women’s Asian Cup. They are the first side from West Asia to take part in the Women’s Asian Cup and this inspires us.
“We have just started our own U-19 championship in Lebanon and we plan to participate in the AFC U-19 Women’s Championship 2015 Qualifiers this November. So, the wheels have started turning for us.”
Another participant, Laos Football Federation Women’s Committee Chairman Korakoth Thanousing, echoed his Lebanese colleague’s feelings.
He said: “We had a good experience during the workshop and we learned a lot from Europe and Asia itself. The instructors are excellent and highly experienced and many other participants also came and shared ideas which we can discuss and implement at home.
“There are various support programmes available to us and I think grassroots is very important and highly relevant to us. We lack women’s players so we need to start from the girls.
“In Laos, we only have a senior team already established but we have just created our U-14 and U-16 teams and we are thinking of taking part in the AFC U-14 Girls’ Regional and U-16 Women’s Championships. We also feel motivated by the work and achievements by the other MAs to develop our women’s football further.”
Both Laos and Lebanon are among the participating MAs in the AFC Women’s Assistance Programme which is a development tool that aims to customise development programmes according to the MAs’ level of women’s football and needs.