BFF-UNICEF U-16 football starts today

After a one-year break due to the Covid-19 pandemic, the BFF-UNICEF Under-16 Women's Football Championship will get underway today with 42 districts taking part in the qualifying round across the country.

Participating teams, split into seven groups, will play a knockout games before one team from each advances to the final. Those seven and the hosts of the final round will then compete in the eight-team final round from April 1.

The qualifying round starts in Mymensigh today before 70-minute matches are played in Munshiganj, Brahmanbaria, Dinajpur, Rajshahi, Khulna and Patuakhali.

"Although it is a meet for U-16 girls, the championship will feature U-12 girls in order to give them a greater opportunity to play football," BFF Women's Football Committee chairman Mahfuza Akter Kiran said at a press conference at the BFF House yesterday.

She added that BFF coaches would be deployed in each of the seven venues to scout talented players that will later be given advanced training and groomed for national age-level teams.