ROY KRISHNA
Boosts National Football squad in Ba
Confusion continues to grow as Oceania Football Centre, a sports website, named two Ba footballers for testing positive for drug use.
The website that came into prominence in January of last year published the classified Fiji Football Association information even before the body named the players. What is strange about the website is that it displays no fixed address, phone contact and all information is through email exchange and conflicts with the Oceania Football Confederation name.
The ‘abouts’ section of the website claims to have a Brazilian behind it, who is ‘passionate about the sport’
It claims to have people in the respective Oceania countries, who are all about improving the standard of the sport.
Dustin Prasad, a freelance blogger in Sydney, Australia said he was greeted with surprise as the website was prompt with the 2020 Punjas Battle of the Giants match reporting.
“They were first to post stories with interviews on its site,”Prasad said.
“What is even more bizarre is that they, OFC, broke the news of Saula Waqa and Manasa Nawakula’s positive drug test even before Fiji FA made it official.
“None of the mainstream media did a story.”
Prasad said it all appears that the website has an insider who works with the website.
“I don’t want to speculate but every indication points to people in places of work and that is how information is shared.”
In the months leading up to the restart of the Vodafone Premier League season, following the outbreak of COVID-19, the website published a full bio-data of all Fijian footballers registered with the Fiji FA.
Prasad said the only way that detailed information could be extracted is through classified information sharing and the Fiji FA needs to look into its security protocols. “Now what I have seen is the very picture that Fiji FA uses on its website with watermark on, is on the OFC without the watermark, in its original form.”