They are very adept at ensuring some regulations are followed strictly to the letter while happy to shut their eyes to more serious misdemeanours.
Sriwijaya were recently fined 25,000 USD for a number of sins committed during their AFC Cup game with TSW Pegasus from Hong Kong. Among their errors? An unequipped medical room! Begs the question though, dunnit. If there was no medical equipment in the room then perhaps the room in question was not a medical room?
At the same game they were in trouble because the team manager did not attend the technical meeting nor did he sign the team sheet. You can imagine an AFC jobsworth with his clip board keenly adding ticks and, hopefully, crosses to the paperwork that is his existence.
But what about when the ticket office refuses to sell tickets to fans, saying they're all gone and pointing to a scalper who has their hands full of them and will happily sell them to you for a premium of course. Does this come under any code of conduct?
Of course the AFC jobsworth won't know anything about this. They will be so busy making sure people attend meetings, there is enough band aid to go around and pointing people in the right direction that they won't actually spend any time at all going through the fan's experience.
For example I would love to see one of these AFC types wade through the piss and shit to use the urinals at some of these stadiums like fans have to. And of course the fans pay for the privilege.
Yes, it's right that teams should get stung if they don't travel with a media officer which is what happened to Arema earlier this year but shouldn't AFC also be focussing on quality control from the fan's viewpoint? Because of course the world still spins without a media office but football without fans is nothing.
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