The Commonwealth of North Mariana Islands has won its first ever international match.
The game was only an U-15 game but the 2-1 victory last month over the former Portuguese colony of Macau in a youth tournament in Taiwan was fitting first ever-win.
The Korean, Japanese, Chinese and Thai communities on Saipan and some of the US citizens had played unorganized football on Saipan for years but the North Mariana Islands FA was only set up after a US lawyer, Peter Coleman, came to work on the main island of Saipan and set up a youth league to give his son a game.
The 14 islands – part of the United Nations trust territory in the Pacific but administered by the United States - first played internationally five years ago after invited being as guests to the 2006 U-14 East Asian Football Federation (EAFF) youth festival in Beijing (pictured).
Peter Coleman has since stepped aside but, driven by president Jerry Tan, NIMFA is now a member of the EAFF and an associate member of the Asian Football Confederation.
1 comment:
Great Article and thank you for the coverage. I was there - and what a great thing it was to see those young men (who put in some real hard and HOT) work get a just reward.
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Um, with respect to the history of football on Saipan: The Korean, Japanese, Chinese and Thai communities - and even some of us soccer-ized US citizens - have been playing (unorganized) football here for many, many years...but the NMIFA has finally put us on the map of organized football in Asia.
The credit needs to go to Mr. J. Tan and all the volunteers who have made it happen including Peter C.
Thanks again for your coverage.
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