In September 2023, the first qualifying matches for the 2026 World Cup will take place, but the 2026 competition is yet another which will have no involvement from the Federated States of Micronesia.
The Pacific nation, made up of four island states, has very little in the way of competitive football heritage thanks to a combination of factors. Its population of just over 100,000 - roughly equivalent to Jersey and about 20,000 more than European microstate Andorra - but more than 2,000km separates the furthest points in the country.
Put into context, that’s roughly the distance between London and Marrakech. The sparse population, large distances and infrequent flights make any organised sport a challenge, as does a landscape vulnerable to flooding, but the Micro Futsal Cup - the first tournament of its kind with teams from all four islands - is looking to change that.
Some 20 years have passed since a senior team representing all four islands played official matches. An under-23 squad suffered heavy losses in an attempted 2015 comeback, but there has still been no movement on FIFA recognition.
Back in 2018, however, FSM hosted the Micronesian Games. That took place on the Island of Yap - the third-largest of the four islands by population, and Yap sent a team to the games along with fellow states Chuuk, Kosrae and Pohnpei.
Yap took silver in the football tournament, behind Pohnpei, with independent Pacific island countries including Palau and Kiribati involved in the tournament as a whole. However, the delayed 2024 edition of the Micro Games - held on the Marshall Islands - has not found room for football at all.
This has prompted the four FSM islands to come together for a tournament of their own.
However, rather than opting for a full 11-a-side tournament, they have opted for the smaller-sided futsal with each island sending a team to Pohnpei for the big kick-off on July 8. Mirror Football spoke to representatives from a number of the states, as well as British coach and former Pohnpei national team manager Paul Watson.
“The major advantage of futsal in the region is that it is indoor,” Watson recognises. “This means that pitches don't flood, which happens regularly outdoors due to the very wet climate.
“It also requires fewer players which reduces the issue of airfares. Plus, people in Micronesia are familiar with basketball and so futsal is easier to understand from the off and it allows for lots of active touches and being involved in the game.”
The tournament will take a group format, ensuring no state travels long distances just for one match. However, due to the infrequent flights, some of those not already based in Pohnpei are forced to fly in a few days before the tournament and fly out the best part of a week after.
Pohnpei’s gold medalists in 2018 were coached by Vasanta Senarathgoda, who now serves as interim secretary general of FSM FA in Pohnpei. Senarathgoda, a Sri Lankan who moved to FSM to work as a teacher in 2002 and has stayed since, lays bare the issues standing in the way of further growth.
“The biggest challenge is lack of equipment, infrastructure, support from the government sector, unable to seek professional personnel help due to lack of funds and resources,” he says. “To overcome We have to seek donations from the private sector and donors around the world. Being a volunteer for all these years for the love of the sport and to keep it going.”
As well as being infrequent, flights between the islands aren’t cheap, with Sean Southwick - interim vice-president of FSM FA from Yap - telling Mirror Football some squads for the upcoming tournament are smaller in size to avoid significant airfares. “We're sending only four [from Yap to Pohnpei, where they will join a fifth player already in Pohnpei] because if we sent the extra two that's an extra $2000 that we don't have,” he says.
In order to help fund teams’ travel and equipment, Watson has worked with officers from the four islands - as well as kit manufacturer Stingz - to sell team shirts around the world.
“I'd expected we might sell 100, and now we've just sold our 800th shirt!” Watson says over email. “It has wildly surpassed anything we could've expected.
“100% of revenue goes to the teams and the tournament, so it has almost entirely funded the event, which is crucial given how tough it is to find funding. It's also a great way to show people in Micronesia how the sport can connect them to the world, that there are people in Brazil, Italy, Japan etc wearing Pohnpei or Yap shirts is just so powerful a message of inclusion.”
If the tournament is a success, an annual or biannual event is the next target. An increased interest in the country could be what’s needed to convince political leaders to back football and/or futsal financially, but that’s only step one.
“The way I see it, it's really the people outside who we need to really push for,” says Chris Diau, interim vice-president of FSM FA in Kosrae. Diau hails from the Solomon Islands, a country with a stronger football heritage, whose men’s team came within one game of a play-off for the 2022 World Cup
“[We need] to open minds and keep their support going. In that case we will look forward to ask for coaching, especially for the locals to get involved, and that way they will feel they have the ownership of bringing their own [input] to growing the sport.”
Many on the islands have relied on volunteers to grow football in a country where basketball and volleyball are the most popular sports. Southwick, the Yapese official, suggests this relates in part to “the history of occupation in the area” with Japan and the United States administering the islands before independence was declared in the 1980s.
An Australian volunteer helped develop the sport in the lead-up to the 2015 Pacific Games, where FSM sent a team of under-23- players. However, while some hoped this could help bring the sport forward, three heavy defeats - all by 30 goals or more - had the opposite effect.
“They knew they wouldn't win, they wouldn't do well, but they were trying to start a young team so they could get experience and build on from that,” Southwick says. “But I think the losses were just too much and it was the opposite, it set us back.
“I think they had the right idea but it was too much of a loss. Soccer wasn't that popular to begin with, there wasn't much funding, and I think after that it was just all the focus went to the other sports.
“At the time I think there were seven or eight teams competing in the league [on Yap] and there were leagues every year, but since the Pacific Games, since our loss, and especially since Covid, it's been dying. I mean, sports in general have been dying, but there's still a lot more support for basketball and volleyball than for soccer.”
Watson acknowledges these issues, too, pointing out how one setback can lead to knock-on effects. For this reason, a successful Micro Futsal Cup could have real influence when it comes to reversing such a trend.
“Geography is a huge issue,” he says. “It's hard to motivate people to play when there's nobody to play against, no peak for the talented players. There's also pretty much zero funding for football because FIFA don't help and that means the sport struggles to be seen as legitimate compared to other sports.”
Not only do FSM have no team within FIFA’s structure, they have struggled to even establish one at a continental level. Efforts have been made to bring a national side under the auspices of either AFC (where Australia and nearby Guam play) or OFC (the Oceanian confederation) but with no success.
“I believe the goal right now is we're trying to shoot for the OFC,” says Southwick. His father was close to those involved in the AFC negotiations, which he estimates took place “five to seven years ago” but were repeatedly delayed to the point that FSM were asked to reapply.
“[OFC has] easier competition, it's closer. Right now we don't even have an official FA so we're trying to get that done this summer after the tournament where we can all get together to vote on officers and make it official.
“We're hoping this tournament goes really well so that people can see there is potential in the sport, and it can hopefully help supporters more, because we need the support from within the country before we can start asking the OFC for support. if there's no one to play the sport here then it's kind of like 'what do we have to back it up?'.”
Preparations for the Micro Futsal Cup have been long and drawn out, relying on volunteers and support from overseas. After overcoming so many obstacles, though, there is excitement at finally bringing the four islands together for what many hope will be the first of many tournaments of its kind.
“Hopefully by having a successful tournament - especially with all the publicity we're getting from outside - we're hoping we can show the potential soccer has in the nation. For Yap, we also applied for a grant from our congress to try to get money to travel, but we got denied. So hopefully things like that will be easier once we show what we can actually do.
“Right now, here in Kosrae especially, it really needs more support from their own leaders,” Diau says. “We'll slowly but surely go forward developing the sport of soccer as well as futsal. When we introduce them we'll keep pushing and pushing for them to be involved, and as long as they're involved and do it on their own, I believe the sport will grow.”
