After suffering two defeats at the hands of Bo Rangers and lowly Freetown City respectively, East End Lions received a further blow on Thursday 6th April 2021 when the premier league ruled against them in their abandoned match against newly promoted Bai Bureh Warriors.
According to a statement signed by the chairman of the Premier League Board Allieu Vandy Koroma, three points and three goals will be awarded to Bai Bureh Warriors and the former champions, East End Lions will also pay a fine of two million five hundred thousand Leones.
Koroma said the decision was reached after reading the match commissioner’s report along with other documents in which match officials are quoted as saying that “a group of supporters putting on East End Lions jerseys rushed at (the officiating team) accusing them of being biased” while making further threatening remarks.
The report states that “East End Lions supporters stormed the field of play in protest against a penalty” that was awarded to Bai Bureh Warriors. The match Commissioner’s reports says that “before the start of the game hundreds of supporters of East End Lions entered the field without paying entrance ticket fees and efforts to stop them proved futile”.
The statement quoted sections of the Premier League rule to support the decisions.
Meanwhile East End Lions also swiftly put out a statement the same day, contesting the FA’s decision claiming “it is the duty of the Premier League Board to provide security for all teams and at all venues”. Lions also claimed their officials, players and supporters were attacked by supporters of Warriors. They said were never summoned to a formal disciplinary hearin and in a rather defiant stance said they “will not be bullied into submission by an inconsistent Premier league Board”. Lions denied of pitch invasion by their supporters and of disrupting play, shifting blame instead on Warriors supporters that they alleged stormed the field in jubilation over a penalty that the visitors said was unjustly awarded to their hosts.
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