MONTEGO BAY, St James – All clubs desirous of participating in the St James Football Association’s Major League, which is set to start in a month’s time, must be registered on the Jamaica Football Federation’s (JFF’s) clubs’ platform and identify a home ground before they will be allowed to take the field.

Parish competition is set to resume in early October after a more than a two-year break due to the novel coronavirus pandemic.

President of the St James FA Gregory Daley says the clubs have to be properly structured if they are to be allowed to take part in the 12-team competition.

In a bid to avoid a repeat of the situation that saw Tier II team Wadada United FC being prevented from playing for a place in the Jamaica Premier League a year ago, Daley said the FA has been working with the clubs to get them ready.

“Clubs must register on the JFF’s system,” Daley told the Jamaica Observer West earlier this week.

“Yes, it’s difficult but we are working with them [clubs]. Already we have had several meetings as well as training sessions to get them familiar with the platform, so far we have had three sessions and we have two more planned before the start of the competition.”

The registration system is part of changes ordered by Fifa, the global ruling body for the sport, where every club playing organised football must have a proper structure, including ownership and bank accounts.

The teams, he stressed, must identify their own grounds as he urged them to “take on responsibilities, those with no home field must form partnerships with schools or other clubs.”

“You need somewhere to play, it can’t be that we play every game at the UDC field that we have no control over,” he argued.

Daley told the Observer West that there are still aspects of the conditions under which the league will be played to be worked out, such as playing days, “so we won’t clash with the schoolboys’ football or the Premier League competitions,” adding that the season will end in December.

With the Tier II competition set to start in February, the champions from the parish competitions must have time to try and qualify for the national competition, he told the Observer West.

“Three months, no more than that time will be allocated to the parish competition. Yes, we would have liked to play five months but we are restarting so this will have to work for now,” he argued.

There will be prize money for the top four teams, he said, noting the St James FA is also trying its best to assist clubs that will be participating in the competition with funding.

“There have been ongoing discussions with sponsors, we are thinking of about $400,000 for the winners, coming out of the pandemic we will try to help as much as possible,” the St James FA president.

Gregory said he is confident that the quality of the football will be of a high level, despite the fact that no competition has been played for over two years.

“With the cutting down of the teams from as many as 40 at one time, the players will be more concentrated in less teams and this will bring out the quality,” he argued.