LAHORE, July 21: Pakistan Football Federation (PFF) on Thursday announced officials for the 18th National Youth Football Championship which will get underway from July 23 at Abbotabad. Sahiwal’s Ch Abdul Rasheed, former FIFA Referee will act as Match Commissioner while another former FIFA referee Qazi Muhammad Asif, now chairman Pakistan Football Referees Association (PFRA), will perform the role of Referee Inspector.

Pakistan Army will defend the title.

Abbottabad’s District Football Association, in collaboration with NWFP Football Association, will organize the event at which the referees will be Muhammad Anwar (Peshawar), Muhammad Sharif (Islamabad), Saeed Ahmed (Quetta), Muhammad Younus Lal (Karachi), Rauf Bari (Lahore) and Muhammad Ali (Peshawar).

The event will help the PFF to form Pakistan U-20 team for the AFC Youth Championship 2006.

Pakistan will be up against two powerful Central Asian nations when they visit Tajikistan for the qualifying phase of Group-E matches.

They will take on Uzbekistan on Nov 23, followed by another crucial encounter against Tajikistan on Nov 25.

The two Central Asian nations will play the third and last match of the group on Nov 27. Tajikistan was selected host on March 23 by the executive committee of the Asian Football Confederation (AFC).

Korea Republic are the defending champions of AFC Youth Championship. The Koreans and Chinese were joined by Japan and Syria in the recently-concluded 15th FIFA World Youth Championship 2005 at The Netherlands as four Asian qualifiers.—APP