Piala Cahya Mata 2026 To Boost Community Football Scene

KUALA LUMPUR, May 22 (Bernama) -- The community football scene in Malaysia is set for a massive boost as the Piala Cahya Mata 2026 will be held concurrently across the country, offering a lucrative total prize pool of RM744,000 for non-professional players.

The tournament will kick off on July 4 and run until November, building on the success of the inaugural event held in Kuching last year.

Cahya Mata Group managing director Datuk Seri Sulaiman Abdul Rahman Abdul Taib said they are expanding their flagship sports event to provide a platform for youth development and community engagement across the country.

He said the community showed good engagement and the players tried really hard in last year’s tournament amid a generally self-centred society.

“Everyone wants to be me, me, me. There’s no unity. There’s no wanting to be part of something, sharing. So, we want to inspire all Malaysians,” he told a press conference here today. 

He said to maintain the tournament's integrity as a grassroots platform, organisers have strictly barred professional players from the Malaysian Football League, Football Association of Malaysia and other major competitive leagues from participating.

The tournament will feature a league format involving an estimated 11,200 players and officials. Malaysian males aged between 16 and 35 are eligible to participate and each team can register up to five players over the age of 35 as part of skill transfer.

Sulaiman Abdul Rahman said the event also emphasises a healthy lifestyle through a stringent drug awareness programme, where players will undergo random urine tests and a single positive result will lead to the immediate disqualification of the entire team.

“The doping test is for communities to be encouraged to stop these drugs. It only harms you. In the long run, you will have side effects that will destroy your health. So, we care for the people,” he said. 

Registration for the tournament is free and remains open until June 20, and interested teams are required to contact their respective state football associations, which have been alloted between 16 and 32 slots per state.

At the state level, winners will walk away with RM20,000, while the overall grand champions determined at the final stage in Kuching will bag a whopping RM100,000 in prize money.

The competition structure will see state winners advancing to a knock-out stage in Kuala Lumpur, before the final four teams travel to Kuching for the Grand Finals, supported by a RM5,000 logistics subsidy for each state champion.

Meanwhile, he said Cahya Mata Group will also be collaborating with a team of national women’s track cyclists, led by Nurul Izzah Izzati Mohd Asri and with Aliana Azizan, Anis Rosidi and Amber Yong as the team members. 

“They can go to different events overseas. It's not cheap to do this. They need equipment and basically we want to help them achieve their goals.

“If we give them support, encouragement, I think they will shine. You know, as I said, Insha-Allah we will be going to the Olympics. And not just one person; we're hoping for four,” he added. 

-- BERNAMA