Five challenges the newly-elected Tunisian FA faces

Goal.com takes a look at the problems that need to be solved by Wadii Jarii and the football governing body to improve the game in the north African country.Saturday, March 31, was a big day for Tunisian football as the first elective assembly since the fall of Zine Abidine Ben Ali was held in the capital, Tunis. Unlike previous occasions, in which the victors were essentially predetermined by the ruling regime, this time four lists vied for Federal Bureau spots in the first democratic election in the country's football history.Though some clearly had misgivings about the application criteria, the north African country’s clubs ultimately selected Wadii Jarii’s list over Tarek Hammami’s in a run-off vote.Despite the fact that the Carthage Eagles performed relatively well in the recent 2012 Africa Cup of Nations, and Esperance, Etoile, Club Africain, and CS Sfaxien continue to shine on the continental club scene, most analysts would agree that Tunisian football is stagnating and has been for some time.Below are the problems that the newly elected FTF must face head on in order to get the country’s most popular sport back on track.Though fan violence was present in Tunisia well before the revolution, the problem has been exacerbated in the aftermath of the January 14 uprising. Thankfully, things haven’t reached the tragic levels of Port Said in Egypt as less severe pitch invasions forced the previous FTF, of which Wadii Jarii was a member, to ban fans from all domestic competitions.While the decision was logical from a security standpoint, the choice has dealt crippling blows to small and medium sized clubs that were already struggling financially and has severely hampered bigger ones as well.Knowing they could lose the supporters' confidence should they fail to address this problem, the nascent Federal Bureau has already proposed to the Ministry of Interior to allow fans over the age of 18 to fill every stadium to 25 per cent of its capacity. While this is commendable, it is admittedly a temporary fix to deeper issues of fan violence and inadequate security measures in venues that need to be addressed thoroughly during the FTF’s mandate.As a small country with a population of approximately 10.5 million people, it is essential for Tunisia to ensure that anyone who wants to play can do so on a decent playing surface.A recent proliferation of private pitches that are rented by the hour has not benefited everyone, as many cannot afford to pay for these fields and most of them are in the capital or other major cities on the coastline.That’s where the FTF comes in. The football body must work with the Ministry of Youth and Sports, which is currently headed by former Esperance legend Tarak Dhiab, to lay and maintain new pitches, especially in the deprived interior regions of the country where the uprising began.Missing out on the 2010 World Cup despite being group leaders going into their last game away to Mozambique was not just a sporting disaster for the Carthage Eagles, it has also created huge financial headaches that the FTF is still dealing with today.The money generated by a World Cup berth was desperately needed to fund new academies, build facilities, and so on. Tunisia have been playing catch up ever since and are still nowhere close to getting the type of funding that north African rivals such as Morocco enjoy. And yet the Carthage Eagles still manage to punch above their weight in continental competitions at both national team and club level.While former FTF president Ali Hafsi was far from a football connoisseur, his business savvy did help reduce the deficit slightly as he jumped ship from Puma, who were paying Tunisia a measly €250,000 per year and signed with Swiss kit manufacturer Burrda who doubled the sum and included performances incentives which the German company had never done.Now, the new FTF must show itself capable of doing even better than their predecessors in this department, starting by selling Tunisian Ligue Professionnelle 1 television rights to the highest bidder, without showing preference to state-owned channels as it always has in the past. Two other challenges on the financial horizon are Roger Lemerre’s unpaid salary and money owed to the Tunisian sport betting company Promosport.Tunisia may have one of the best domestic leagues in Africa but it is still not up to professional standards in many aspects. Some would argue that a major cause for this is that football clubs in the country are legally described as sporting associations instead of companies, even though they function much more like the latter.Wadii Jarii and his colleagues recently told the media that they are working with five judges to figure out the best way for legal texts to be amended so that football clubs can be privatised. The north African nation’s overseeing authority and Ministry of Sports will surely have their say in the matter, with the FTF needing to convince both that this would be beneficial to Tunisian football.Though last year was tough on many levels, strides have already been made in the field of refereeing where foreign officials have been completely barred from matches in Tunisia, allowing locals to become more experienced and used to high pressure fixtures. Now it is time to make sure that said referees are paid adequately so that the lure of match-fixing is decreased.In Tunisia, players that shine in the youth national teams seldom become instrumental players in the senior side.While no one is expecting every single youngster to rise to stardom, the current rate of attrition is far too high to be a coincidence and one of the main causes that has been identified is that Tunisian football has little to no technical direction.For years, the national technical director has had a purely administrative role to play within the FTF. The neglect is starting to show as the north Africans are relying on raw local talent and European-born imports instead of setting a development plan and sticking to it in order to mould a generation of players who have strong physical and technical fundamentals on which to rely. Whether the next director is local or foreign, his duties must be solely technical so that quality footballers emerge thanks to the system, not in spite of it.