2017 LINAFOOT Season: Why Chad’s Premier League Was Abandoned
The 2017 LINAFOOT season was supposed to be the second full year of Chad’s top football league. Instead, it vanished - mid-season, without a champion, without closure, and without even a final table. Teams had played a few matches. Players had gone unpaid. Fans had bought tickets. Then, silence. No official announcement. No press conference. Just nothing. By July, the league was officially declared abandoned. And it wasn’t the first time. It wouldn’t be the last.
What Was the 2017 LINAFOOT Season Supposed to Be?
LINAFOOT, or Ligue Nationale de Football, was created in 2015 as Chad’s first nationally organized top-flight league. Before that, football champions were crowned based on regional tournaments - mostly in the capital, N’Djamena. The 2015 season was the only one to finish completely, with Gazelle FC winning it all. The 2016 season started but was scrapped halfway. So when 2017 rolled around, there was hope - fragile, but there.
This time, the Fédération Tchadienne de Football Association (FTFA) tried something new. To cut costs, they split the country into three zones. Zone 1 had six teams from N’Djamena. Zone 2 covered southern cities like Sarh, Moundou, and Doba. Zone 3 stretched across the vast, remote north - Abéché, Mongo, Biltine, and Salamat. The top four from Zone 1 and three from the other zones would move to a final phase. It was a smart idea on paper. Less travel. Lower expenses. A real chance for teams outside the capital to compete.
Stadiums were ready. Matches were scheduled for 4 p.m. local time at Stade d’Académie de Farcha, Stade Omnisports Idriss Mahamat Ouya, and Stade de Paris-Congo. Referees were assigned. Teams had trained. Then, the money ran out.
Why Did It Collapse?
Chad’s economy is one of the poorest in the world. In 2017, the GDP per capita was just $626. The government didn’t have money for schools or hospitals, let alone football. The FTFA needed XAF 150 million (about $250,000 USD) to run the season. They got XAF 52 million - barely enough to cover the first round.
Sponsors promised help. TCHADTEL, COTONTCHAD, and Banque Tchadienne des Marchés pledged support. But only half of that money ever arrived. The government promised XAF 40 million in subsidies. That never came either. By May, referees in Zone 2 hadn’t been paid for their work. Teams from Zone 3 couldn’t afford to travel. The league’s technical director, Mahamat Saleh, later said the final blow was unpaid referee fees and travel costs exceeding XAF 12 million.
FIFA gave Chad $500,000 in development funding that year. Only $150,000 went to the league. CAF, Africa’s football governing body, said Chad met less than half of its minimum standards for a national league. No stadium outside N’Djamena met basic safety and pitch quality requirements. Only 7 of Chad’s 23 regions had venues even close to acceptable.
It wasn’t just money. It was structure. Eight of the 12 teams in the league were based in N’Djamena. That meant the system still favored the capital. Teams from the north and south had to travel hundreds of kilometers on bad roads, often without proper lodging or food. Players went months without pay. Some didn’t get their uniforms. Others borrowed cleats from teammates.
What Happened to the Teams and Players?
Teams like Gazelle FC, Tourbillon, and Elect-Sport had played three or four matches before everything stopped. Ascot, Foullah Edifice, and RFC had also started their campaigns. No one knew if they were leading or trailing. No standings were finalized. No promotion or relegation happened. The planned relegation of the fifth and sixth-placed teams? Never happened.
Players were left unpaid. Many worked part-time jobs just to eat. Some stopped training. Others left the sport entirely. Issa Djimet, a forward for Foullah Edifice, told a local paper: “For the first time, clubs from Abéché and Mongo had a path to the national stage, even if it didn’t finish.” That was the only silver lining.
Fans were furious. On Facebook’s “Tchad Football” group, Mahamat Abderahim wrote: “We paid for stadium tickets for Zone 1 matches in May, but after 3 rounds everything stopped without explanation or refunds.” A survey by Chad’s Sports Ministry found 78% of fans considered the abandonment “unacceptable.” Attendance dropped by more than half in the months after. Why show up if the season might vanish tomorrow?
How Does This Compare to Other African Leagues?
Compare this to South Africa’s DStv Premiership. It’s a 16-team league with $50 million in annual revenue. Teams have full-time medical staff, academies, and marketing departments. Even Nigeria’s league, with its $8 million budget, finishes every season.
Chad’s entire league revenue in 2017 was estimated at $180,000. Sponsorship made up 58% of that. Ticket sales? Just 10%. In stable leagues, ticket sales are 40%. In Chad, fans couldn’t trust the league to last long enough to make the trip worth it.
And it’s not just about money. It’s about legitimacy. The Rec.Sport.Soccer Statistics Foundation (RSSSF) has noted for years that many “national champions” listed for Chad are actually winners of regional leagues - not national ones. The 2017 season was supposed to fix that. It made it worse.
What Happened After 2017?
The 2018 and 2019 seasons didn’t happen. The 2020 season was canceled due to COVID-19. The 2021 season was never scheduled. The 2022 season finally restarted - and Elect-Sport won it. But 2023? Not held. 2024? Also canceled.
The FTFA’s 2023 strategic plan admitted the truth: nationwide competition is unsustainable. Their new plan? Four permanent regional leagues feeding into a national playoff - if funding allows. It’s a step back, but maybe the only realistic path forward.
FIFA has invested $1.2 million in stadium upgrades since 2020. But they say Chad needs at least $750,000 per year just to keep the league running. That money hasn’t come. CAF’s 2024 assessment says Chad meets only 35% of their national league standards. Experts predict it’ll take five years of consistent funding just to reach minimum requirements.
Is There Any Hope for Chadian Football?
There’s passion. There’s talent. The national team, the Gazelles, has players who compete in Europe. But without a functioning domestic league, there’s no pipeline. No youth development. No local stars to look up to.
The 2017 season wasn’t an accident. It was the result of years of neglect. It’s not just about football. It’s about governance. About trust. About whether a country can organize something as basic as a sports league.
Chad’s football story isn’t about bad players or poor tactics. It’s about broken systems. It’s about a country too poor and too unstable to protect its own game. The 2017 season didn’t fail because of weather, injuries, or bad luck. It failed because no one cared enough to make sure it didn’t.
Until that changes, the LINAFOOT will keep disappearing - not with a bang, but with silence. And the fans? They’ll keep buying tickets. Hoping. Always hoping.
Kyle Waitkunas
October 27, 2025 AT 18:11Okay, so let me get this straight… the entire league collapsed because of MONEY?!!? Not corruption? Not a coup? Not some secret deal with the Saudis to bury African football under sand and silence? Nooo, it’s just… the money ran out? That’s it? That’s the whole plot? I mean, come ON. This isn’t a third-world football league-it’s a geopolitical thriller disguised as a sports article. Who really controlled the XAF 150 million? Who diverted the FIFA funds? Who knew the referees wouldn’t get paid and still scheduled the matches? I’ve seen more transparency in a Ponzi scheme. And don’t tell me it’s ‘poverty’-poverty doesn’t erase entire seasons. Poverty doesn’t make people sign contracts they know won’t be honored. This was a planned disappearance. Someone wanted LINAFOOT to fail. And now? Now we’re all just… waiting for the next silent collapse. 🕵️♂️💣
vonley smith
October 27, 2025 AT 21:08Man, this hits hard. I grew up watching local leagues in small towns back home-same kind of heart, same kind of struggle. Players showing up in mismatched cleats, moms selling fried plantains to help fund bus fare, coaches using their own phones to call refs because the federation didn’t have a line… it’s not just Chad. It’s everywhere the system forgets to show up. But what’s wild is how much hope they still had in 2017. They split the zones. They tried to make it fair. That’s more than most places do. I just wish someone had stepped in before the last referee went unpaid. You don’t need millions-you just need someone who cares enough to say, ‘Not today.’
Melodye Drake
October 28, 2025 AT 19:28It’s truly heartbreaking, isn’t it? Not because football is sacred, but because this reflects such a profound failure of institutional care. The fact that a nation can’t even sustain a professional sports league-when it has the *passion*, the *players*, the *stadiums*-says everything about misplaced priorities. We’re talking about a country where children dream of becoming footballers, yet the state can’t guarantee they’ll get paid for playing? And then there’s the hypocrisy: FIFA sends $500k, but only $150k reaches the league? That’s not aid-that’s performative charity. The real tragedy isn’t the abandoned season. It’s that no one in power seems to think this is worth fixing. And honestly? That’s the most chilling part.
paul boland
October 28, 2025 AT 21:14harrison houghton
October 29, 2025 AT 14:36There is a deeper truth here. Football is not just a game. It is a mirror. And Chad’s mirror is cracked-not because the players are broken, but because the society that holds it is. When a country cannot fund a football league, it has already chosen to abandon its people’s joy. Not their health. Not their education. Not their future. But their joy. Because joy is the first thing that gets cut when power forgets its humanity. The 2017 season didn’t die from lack of money. It died from lack of meaning. And that is the most dangerous kind of poverty. The kind that doesn’t show up on spreadsheets. The kind that whispers: ‘You are not worth protecting.’