Players at the Old Stadium in action during a deaf football tournament organised by the ISF in March 2012. Photograph supplied

The Indochina Starfish Foundation, in partnership with the Football Federation of Cambodia, will organise a day-long football tournament for players with hearing impairment at the Mekong Pitch on Sunday.

As many as 15 teams from NGOs in four provinces will take part in the event, which runs from 9am to 5pm on a round robin format leading to knockout quarterfinals, semis and final.

The men’s section is made up of 11 sides, while the women’s event involves four. All participants are aged 16 years old and above. Players younger than 16 have already been integrated with the regular ISF League.

In 2010 the ISF, which is currently supporting a football program involving 3,500 youngsters attached to 30 NGOs in eight provinces, began research to find ways to help players of all abilities and decided to concentrate on one disability at a time.

As a follow-up, the ISF organised Cambodia’s first football tournament for the deaf in March 2011.

The success of this tournament spurred ISF’s commitment to help an estimated 50,000 youths who suffer from varying degrees of hearing disability.

To contact the reporter on this story: H S Manjunath at [email protected]