Is the National County Sports Meet Becoming an Embarrassment?

By: Roland James

Paynesville City: The National County Sports Meet of Liberia seems to be appearing as an embarrassment to many local and International sports lovers who have continued to express their disappointment in several central referees for poor officiation of crucial matches.

The annual traditional sports tournament that is annually organized by the Ministry of Youth and Sports has suffered criticism from county supporters over time and even at the current moment of the 2023-2024 edition of the tournament which the ministry seems not to be resolving.

To retrospect, the poor officiation of crucial matches by central referees assigned for the National County Sports Meet during the 2019-2020 edition of the tournament aggregated supporters of Nimba County to invade the playing pitch thereby causing insecurity for fans including the central referee.

The repeat of this action was witnessed on Monday, April 29, 2024, in the quarter-final match between Grand Gedeh and Nimba when fans of Grand Gedeh moved onto the playing pitch damaging substitute benches and affecting some bucket seats around the stadium from what many considered as poor officiating and biases of the Central Referee, Josephus Torjilar. 

Central Referee Torjilar ruled out a possible goal from Grand Gedeh County without acknowledging a foul, nor offside to state sufficient reasons for justifying the cancellation of the goal which Grand Gedeh hoped to have taken a lead with against Nimba with just few minutes to the end of an extra time match. However, the game ended on penalty shootouts with Nimba taking a 4-2 win, something that aggravated supporters of Grand Gedeh, resulting in a chaotic moment.

Tension intensified among supporters of both counties at the Samuel Kanyon Doe Sports Complex as three Police officers were wounded and a supporter yet to be fully identified is reported to be in critical condition due to sustained wounds from tough clashes.

Many sports pundits have described Torjilar's decision as unfair and hopes that the Ministry of Youth and Sports as the official arm of the tournament calls him to order by investigating his rationale for ruling out the goal.

Torjilar is on record as being banned from refereeing for two seasons by the Liberia Football Association after the official admitted to receiving about US$100 from a side in a second-division relegation play-off match between Srimex FC and Pags FC back in 2019.

Was JosephusTorjilar the Only Option?

since the incident later today, several citizens including Nimba county district #7 Representative has expressed frustration over the referee decision stating that Nimba County did not deserve the win. 

Musa Hassan Bility wrote on his social media handle, "We didn't need this help from him. While it didn't mean victory for them, the goal they scored was perfect. Football doesn't deserve this. The truth is the truth even if it's against you. This was against us. The victory is undeserved".

However, the embarrassing moment on Monday by Central Referee Torjilar marked another setback for the tournament. A similar situation was noticed on Sunday during the Bomi and Lofa clash which led fans of Bomi to physically assault the central referee for refusing to acknowledge a penalty to their advantage.

As it stands, the Blue Lakers of Bomi county has also filed a complaint to the National steering committee, House of Representatives and the Liberian senate, bringing to the attention alleged poor handling of the match between them and Lofa county last week.

The controversies from central referees in the ongoing tournament of the County Meet have made local sports lovers recommending to the Liberia Football Association (LFA) to ensure sufficient training for assigned referees across every tournament in the country.

Local sport lovers commented on major sports outlets: "The referee is a complete disappointment to Liberian football. How can you cancel a clean goal that has no attachment ?".  Another supporter: "If you want to organize a county unity game and put cheating inside you always create problems between both counties".

This comes as a wake-up call to the Ministry of Youth and Sports to properly vet referees who are assigned to officiate matches in the National County Sports Meet before the situation results in supporters losing the taste of the country's annual traditional sports tournament.