The Island of Mallorca Sports, Culture & Transparency Department Director Ruth Mateu, the City Council’s Sports & Youth Department Director, Carles Gonyalons, and the Baleric Football Association, Miquel Bestard, have introduced four new measures that will be in force from this season on. These measures are aimed at fostering fair play between teams and will applied on the matches played at all the academy categories from prejunior level to competitions under 16 years old.
Among the agreed measures, the first one is the so-called “white card”, which will recognize fair play and good values. It will be awarded to those actions that encourage fair play and sportsmanship in football and futsal’s youth categories in all islands of the Balearic archipielago, as Island of Mallorca Sports Director Ruth Mateu has stated.
In addition, the goal difference limit in a single match between two teams will be reduced to 10 goals in order to avoid excessive scoring festivals in academy football. Once a 10-goal difference is reached, the score will be closed, written on the match report and added to the league table. After the scores stretches to a 10-goal difference, the remaining time will be played normally. Yet if another goal is scored it will not be counted. After another hypothetical goal, a goal kick will be awarded.
In the same vein, it has also been decided that in the websites of the Balearic Football Association and in match reports there will be no reference to goal scorers in games played in the youngest ages of academy football and futsal up until kids under 10.
The presentation meeting of these new measures has been attended by some of the main Balearic football and futsal clubs representatives such as those of RCD Mallorca, Collerense, Son Sardina and Palma Futsal.
Island of Mallorca Sports Director Ruth Mateu has linked these four greenlit measures to the programme “Let’s add values into sport”, developed by the Island of Mallorca Sports & Youth Department together with the Departments of the other Balearic islands, as well as the University of the Balearic Islands and the respective associations of football and futsal.