Giwa Football Club of Jos, Plateau State on Wednesday failed to show up for a 2015/2016 Nigeria Professional Football League fixture against Enyimba FC of Aba at the Kwara State stadium in Ilorin.
The Match Day 18 fixture was the third consecutive home match the club will be absent from in Ilorin.
The club was banished to Florin by the League Management Company following crowd violence at the Jos township Stadium.
The tie was against Rangers International FC.
Fans disrupted and caused the match to be stopped after 74 minutes.
Since being sanctioned by the LMC, Giwa FC have refused to play in Ilorin but have attended their away matches.
Wednesday’s tie, which they shunned, was the third match the Jos-based clubside have failed to honour this season and may lead to their being relegated from the NPFL by the LMC.
Article 13.28 of the LMC’s framework states: “If a club fails to honour three matches cumulatively within the league season without an acceptable reasons to LMC, such a club shall be expelled from the league and its matches played and unplayed shall be cancelled.”
On Wednesday in Ilorin, the match’s centre referee, Dele Atoun, called off the match at 4.30pm after fulfilling all “walk-over” formalities.
This was necessary in view of the absence of players and officials of Giwa FC, who had not shown up for the pre-match meeting earlier on Wednesday morning.
Meanwhile, NAN has obtained a copy of a letter written by Giwa FC accepting to play the match against Enyimba, but not in Ilorin.
The five-paragraph letter was signed by the Secretary of the club, Samson Adamu, and dated May 17.
The letter asked LMC to reschedule the game, while the club promised to do their best to uphold the integrity of the league for the good of the game.
NAN.
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