Mohamed Bin Hammam, the President of Asian Football Confederation arrived in Sri Lanka yesterday to attend the opening ceremony of the second phase of the Kalutara Vernon U. Fernando stadium which will be held today at 10.00 am at Kalutara.

The chief guest at the ceremony would be President Mahinda Rajapakse who also opened the first phase of the project in 2004 when he was Prime Minister.

The first phase consisted of the Pavilion, Auditorium, Gym, Dormitory, Rooms and Office with Computerized secretariat. The cost of the project was borne by Sri Lanka Football Federation’s Manilal Fernando from his personal funds.

The second phase which is opened today will consists of another pavilion, Office complex/club houses for Kalutara Premier league clubs .The ground has been re-developed to host international matches as well. The cost of this project was funded by FIFA and Asian Football Confederation and Manilal Fernando as well.

Through the FIFA funds received by Sri Lanka under the FIFA AFC Tsunami Solidarity fund following the 2004 Tsunami disaster, football centres were constructed at Mannar, Ampara, Kalutara, Galle, Badulla, Wattala, Colombo, City, Norwood and Baddegana.FFSL constructed the German-Sri Lanka Football Complex at Matara with the donation received from the German National Team as their response for Tsunami reconstruction.

Hammam will also open the City Football Complex in Colombo and also the Football complex in Mannar on the next two days