Lambert Maltock: we want to include all OFC countries together

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Lambert Maltock is the current president of Oceania Football Confederation and Vanuatu Football Federation. The 63-year-old Ni-Vanuatu football administrator talked to Oceania Football Center about the next steps of Oceanian Football. You can check the full interview below:

How are the plans for OFC Nations Cup? Are the dates and venues confirmed?
I have got all details with me now. New Zealand will host this tournament. It should be around May and June.

Will the format of the competition be the same as the previous editions?
There will be a preliminary play-off first and then the winner of the four Polynesian nations will join the other seven nations for the final stage. We have not changed the format this time, but it is still under discussion for the next OFC Nations Cup.

Do Oceania Football Confederation have plans to make the national teams more actives?
Yes. We have already made substantial progress in discussions together within the OFC to have all 11 Nations playing regularly against each other every year, if possible. With the proposed format under discussion, we want to include all OFC countries together and group them by ranking and region, so that any activity will be affordable, cost-effective and sustainable.

Is this about the OFC Nations League idea?
Yes. It was my idea for improving football performance in the region. It is to be played every year or two years, rather than waiting four years to play a minimum of four international matches.

Are there other ideas to be put in practice in order to reduce the gap from OFC to the other confederations?
We have made discussions and agreements with other confederations like AFC and CONMEBOL to see how they could assist OFC in improving their performance. In June we will sign an agreement with AFC and CONMEBOL. We already have an agreement with UEFA to fund youth football development with exchanges of football and tournament promotions in Europe or in the region that started in 2019.

How they could assist OFC?
We focus on all categories with special emphasis on youth football elites to meet our vision for 2026.

Will we see more youth tournaments and more friendly matches against AFC, UEFA and CONMEBOL members in that case?
Exactly.

What do you think about the changes made by FIFA in the FIFA Club World Cup? Will it affect OFC?
No, it will not affect OFC. It should help OFC by raising our standard of performance. This will allow OFC and other Confederations to introduce new competitions between them to help local clubs better prepare for Club World Cup every year. We will also introduce other tournaments to benefit our clubs in the region.

What are your plans for VFF after the re-election? Do you have new ideas to develop Ni-Vanuatu football?
I have outlined several programmes after the election which can be found on VFF page. We are planning all our activities according to the FIFA Forward 2.0 programme which set specific requirements and targets to meet in order to get access to funding from FIFA. VFF, like any other small OFC nation, rely heavily on FIFA funding. These are the requirements and some other things we are doing:
• Minimum of four FIFA international matches for senior men and women;
• Four international matches for youth men and women;
• The VFF National Youth League Championship has already been launched and must continue for both male and female;
• Vanuatu National Super League for clubs will continue and its format may be changed;
• Vanuatu Senior National League Championship will be launched on 23 January 2020 for the first time ever;
• Strengthening of Northern Region Academy to become a full academy like Teouma Academy;
• Create a new Football Forum to include representatives from stakeholders to have in football of the country, this will be hosted in June 2020;
• A feasibility to set a task for initiating professional football platform in the country along with OFC in 2021;
• Complete the new Fresh Water Stadium (also known as Freswota Stadium) for VFF.

The National Super League intends to be played throughout the year. Will the teams from other member associations have more game time against the top teams of the country as Galaxy and Malampa Revivors?
We have divided our leagues into two main streams up until now. Port Vila Football League is called the Elite League and the other seven member associations Leagues (including Luganville Football Association) are called Promotional Leagues. It was given a trial period of four years to match up with the Port Vila Elite League. In 2016 Nalkutan FC became Champions of Vanuatu by beating Champions of Port Vila, and in 2019 Malampa Revivors became the Champions by beating Galaxy FC from Port Vila. We are now looking into a new format to embrace the leagues in order to make it more competitive so that clubs can improve their standard. There will be a football forum in June which will talk about all these assessments to explore new horizons on how to move forward.

Are there any new investments in media being made by OFC and the local federations? OFC is little known in the football world and the lack of proper information is one of the main reasons for that.
Each federation has its own internal problems. Normally within the funds which are allocated to each member association, media should be included. But each member association set its priorities and apply for funding. With regards to OFC we have MyCujoo that relay all continental matches and our website reports all activities. The OFC Media Officer left last year and we have not yet replaced her. In Vanuatu we brought in a new Media Officer, Matt Temar, at the end of last year.

The main issue comes from the local leagues. People struggle to know reliable information about the leagues like squads, standings, final scores and top scorers. It also happens in other nations, specially at the bottom four ranked Polynesian nations.
Yes. I agree with that because we concentrate mainly running the tournaments or activities and there was no specific media officer to relay these activities. That is why we recruited Matt Temar for purpose and with the COMET system, it will become easier. The Congress has raised these concerns because many activities happened in the islands without report updates. Just for information, we (VFF) have registered more players (seniors and youth alike) more than before in the COMET system. We have discussed that information such as fixtures, results, scorers etc. must be updated on a regular basis – weekly at least.

Thanks for your interview it will be very important for the followers of Oceania Football
You welcome. This is what we need to let the world know about Vanuatu and Oceania.

Oceania Football Center thank Lambert Maltock for hist availability and patience to answer all these questions.