KUALA LUMPUR: The ninth International Football Club (IFC) Football 9s on Sept 22-23 will be held in Krabi, Thailand.
IFC, a local veterans football club, are the only Malaysian team to have a proud tradition of hosting their event in various cities across Asia.
The tournament, which was first held in 2009 at Kelab Aman, have attracted 16 teams this year, including defending champions Century Lucky Star from China.
Other foreign teams include Qantas from Australia, Brickwork Boyz from Singapore, Bangkok Airways, Krabi United and BigFoot Kickers from Thailand and Shanghai Lanyin FC from China.
The two-day competition in collaboration with the Thailand Authority of Tourism (TAT), will first be played in a round robin format at the Krabi Power Plant ground before moving into the knockout stage, where teams will be separated into two pools.
Players competing are aged 40 and above.
Besides hosting their tournaments overseas, IFC also carries out its social responsibility by doing charity.
In 2015, IFC donated their funds from the tournament to the Ranau Earthquake fund, while in 2014 and 2016 (both in Cambodia), the funds were channeled to a local hospital.
Collections from this year's tournament will go to the Krabi Special Education Centre.
Members of the club will also be celebrating the life of their former president Steve Krupa, who passed away earlier this year due to illness.
Organising chairman Kiranjit Singh said: "Steve would not have wanted it any other way. He would want us to celebrate his life by remembering the good times we had with him.
"We miss him but the show must go on. We dedicate this year's tournament to Steve."
The IFC Football 9s has attracted a number of local legends with some playing actively such as Datuk Soh Chin Aun, Datuk Santokh Singh, Zainal Nordin, Azrul Amri Burhan, V.Kalimutu, M.Chandran and the late Wong Choon Wah.
The late Karl Heinz Weigang, who was Malaysia's national football coach in the early 80s, was the IFC's first captain/coach.