KARACHI, Aug 21: Pakistan soccer officials have put the Asian Football Confederation (AFC) in a fix as the former has neither confirmed nor declined to participate in the Under-17 Asian championship.

Although the Pakistan Football Federation (PFF) has opted to skip the 12-team contest to be hosted by the UAE emirates of Dubai and Abu Dhabi from Sept 6 to 22, it has not informed the AFC officially about the decision.

Pakistan were offered to participate in the competition after the world governing body of the sport FIFA and AFC suspended the qualifiers Tajikistan because of internal problems.

The offer from the AFC came since Pakistan finished runners-up in the qualifiers organized in Dushanbe in May.

Apart from hosts UAE, China, India, Myanmar, Yemen, Vietnam, South Korea, Qatar, Japan, Syria, Uzbekistan will be in fray.

“We (the AFC) are unaware of Pakistan having declined to participate in the Under-17 tournament. Pakistan are the replacement for Tajikistan as they finished runners-up in the group,” an AFC spokesmen told Dawn from Kuala Lumpur.

While the PFF has missed the golden opportunity of providing international exposure to youngsters, according to the AFC, North Korea replace Tajikistan in the Asian Games football contest, while Palestine fill in Jordan’s place who have withdrawn.

Nevertheless, it is strange why the PFF chose not to intimate the Asian body when it has decided against participating in the event.

The latest step taken by the PFF is ample proof that officials are least bothered in focussing at junior-level football.

Juniors also suffered last year when PFF decided not to take part in the Under-14 Asian championship despite an invitation by hosts Bangladesh as Pakistan didn’t have an Under-14 squad.

While the seniors have disappointed, junior squads have shown immense talent, at least at the Asian level.

First, the Under-19 squad qualified for the Asian championship main round in 2000 and then Under-20 missed the final Asian championship berth in April this year after drawing 2-2 with Bangladesh who reached the final round on better goal average.

Meanwhile, the AFC official said, the contracts of the two coaches provided by the AFC, John Layton and Jozef Herel, were under review based on the Pakistan’s suspension of development fund programme.

“No decision has been made as such by the AFC on coaches’ status at this point,” the AFC official said.

Mohamed bin Hammam, the newly-elected AFC president had suspended development funding programme of the 26 national associations saying “they had failed to yield desired results.”