Sports Reporter :
“The Bangladesh Football Federation showed its ability of hosting FIFA World Cup Football qualifying match on November 17. That day the BFF organized the high profile Bangladesh versus Australia match at the Bangabandhu National Stadium and not a single finger was raised against its capability, said Md Abu Nayeem Shohag, the General Secretary of Bangladesh Football Federation (BFF) on Thursday. He said this while talking with this Reporter in his office room about the BFF’s organisational capacity.
Nayeem Shohag said, ” BFF earned a handsome amount of money from the television rights by staging that match. BFF got Tk 10 lakh from the sale proceeds of the tickets.”
He said, Australia are the reigning Asia champions and played four times in the World Cup final round. So they deserved VVIP security.
The Football Federation of Australia appealed to the FIFA to arrange the match against Bangladesh on a neutral venue, citing security reason.
Later, security delegation from Australia and the FIFA visited Bangladesh and expressed their satisfaction about security measures.
All security agencies of Bangladesh were involved with the security of Australia Football team and Bangladesh Football Federation gave all kind of logistic supports to the security agencies.
BFF spent Tk seven to eight lakh for security of the match and at the same time proved its capability of hosting a high profile match what it once did between Argentina and Nigeria in Dhaka..
In this regard, he said that Australia Cricke team postponed their tour of Bangladesh for so-called security reason. But it had not been possible in football because FIFA was fully aware of our dedication to soccer.
The BFF GS also added that the security agencies of Bangladesh submitted their security plans to FIFA which highly satisfied the officials.
By staging that match, BFF will get more chances to host big matches in future.
He said, “Australia- the powerhouse of Asian Footbal deserved such kind of security.”
He claimed that BFF did not lose anything, rather it gained a lot which would help us in future.
