25 February 2019 – The Zimbabwe Football Association (ZIFA) delegation comprising of new President, Felton Kamambo and his executive, concluded their week-long exchange programme to SAFA House on Friday, 22 February.

The visit is part of an exchange programme between the two Associations that saw the delegation being taken through the daily operations of the South African Football Association (SAFA), with a strong emphasis on sound administration.

Part of the presentations made to ZIFA was the ground-breaking MYSAFA Player Registration & Competitions Management system which was launched by the Association in February 2017.

A first of its kind not only for South African football but for the continent as a whole, MYSAFA has successfully registered over 205 000 footballers across the country with the number growing substantially on a daily basis.

With age-cheating being one of the main challenges to the growth of the game on the continent, the ZIFA delegation was very impressed with how the MYSAFA system is linked to the department of home affairs, making it very difficult for players and clubs to cheat.

The ZIFA delegation, comprised of department heads from refereeing, development and the Zimbabwe Premier League, was taken through the three different aspects of MYSAFA which include player registration, competition management and the public site.

MYSAFA player card examples were also shared with the delegation, highlighting the QR code which can be used to scan and confirm the card’s legitimacy through the free MYSAFA Verifier app, currently available for Android phones.

The delegation was also impressed to see that each card includes unique a FIFA player id, assigned by the Connect Id international player registration system. Once registered with FIFA, each player retains this id for life and, among other benefits, will assist with solidarity payments to clubs developing professional players.

Chairman of the Zimbabwe Premier Soccer League, Farai Jere lauded the system and hoped other African FAs would adopt it.

“Age-cheating has held back the development of football on our continent for years and this is something we have struggled to solve. Through this unique system, I strongly believe we can curb this scourge of age-cheating and improve the rate of player identification and development” said Jere.

For more info on MYSAFA visit their Facebook page or contact the MYSAFA support team on 041 583 1932.