Grand Bassa Fines US$2,500 For Acts of Bad Sportsmanship in County Meet Third Place Final in Paynesville

Paynesville, Liberia: The Ministry of Youth and Sports has fined Grand Bassa County Two Thousand Five Hundred United States Dollars (2,500) for act of bad Sportsmanship displayed by walking out of the field before the end of full-90 minutes in the National County Sports Meet Football third place final against Nimba County.

Grand Bassa County on Saturday, May 4, deliberately walked out of the field and refused to continue the third final at the Samuel Kayon Doe Sports Complex after the central referee awarded Nimba County a penalty from a foul committed by a Grand Bassa defender.

The decision of Grand Bassa County brought the game to a momentary standstill for about 15 minutes, with players and technical staff of Grand Bassa holding the view that the penalty awarded was uncalled for, something that brought the match to a premature end.

The Gbezhon boys of Grand Bassa were in the lead against Nimba 1-0 with a beautiful strike from Theo Williams before the disruption that led to the premature end of the game, thereby leaving the Steering Committee of the National County Sports Meet to award Nimba County as winners of the third place in Football Category of the 2023-2024 edition of the tournament.

The Ministry of Youth and Sports in a release issued hours after the match said the action exhibited by Grand Bassa County violates Article 21.2 of the 2023/2024 National County Sports Meet rules and regulations.

The Ministry quotes Article 21.2 as saying, “Any County which refuses to play or withdraw from a scheduled match, without the consent of the Organizing Committee shall

be fined Two Thousand, Five Hundred United States Dollars (S2,500.00)".

The Steering Committee of the Ministry of Youth and Sports explained that it is against said background that Grand Bassa County has been fined such an amount, underscoring that it sees the act on the part of Grand Bassa County as an attempt to undermine the National County Sports Meet and brings the competition to public ridicule and a complete embarrassment.

Meanwhile, the Ministry has suspended three officials of the Grand Bassa County Football Team, namely Ezekiel Johnson, Team Manager, Victoria Geeplay, Administrative Manager, Philip Kangar, member of the sports board of Grand Bassa County from participating in all organized activities of the Ministry of Youth and Sports for two (2) years.

According to the Ministry of Youth and Sports, the trio were involved in inciting and instigating the refusal and unprofessional behavior of the Grand Bassa Football Team in violation of Article 21.10 of the rules governing the National County Sports Meet.

However, Nimba County was awarded Five hundred thousand Liberian Dollars (500,000) and Lofa County a sum of Fifth thousand Liberian Dollars (50,000) respectively as Football and Kickball third-place winners of this year's edition of the county meet.

The last time that a county walked out of the pitch in the National County Sports Meet was in 2019-2020 when Nimba County walked out of the field in the Grand Final against Grand Kru over controversy of the central referee awarding an unfair penalty to Grand Kru County.