LANDI KOTAL, June 22: Paucity of funds and lack of proper official patronage will deprive the Fata Under-15 Football team to participate in the forthcoming National Under-15 Championship to be held in Multan from June 27.

Secretary Fata Football Association Nisar Ahmad told Dawn here that his plea for financial assistance was turned down by the Fata Sports Directorate on the ground that they too were faced with monetary constraints.

The Fata Sports Director Faisal Jamil told Dawn that his department has exhausted all its funds by participating in the last National Games in Karachi and is now allocated only ten percent funds by the Fata Secretariat which he said were insufficient for the development and organizing of sporting activities in tribal areas.

He said his association organized training camp for the Fata U-15 team out of their own resources but he expressed his inability to bear transportation and boarding charges of the team upto Multan.

Nisar Ahmad said that the same team was runner up in the under-13 National Football Championship held in Lahore in the year 2005 and the then NWFP Governor Khalilur Rehman also awarded cash prices to the players of Fata team.