Foolish Legal Error Costs Kalju First Win of the Season
Kalju's hard earned 1-0 win over FC Infonet in the first round of the new football season has been overturned as Kalju used a player who had been banned for one match at the very end of the last season.
Andre Järva received a red card in the last game of the 2013 season, meaning that he was ineligible for the first game of the new season, but Kalju, last year's runner-up in the league, failed to spot the situation, and substituted Järva into the game at the very end, on the 90th minute.
Mihkel Uiboleht, the Football Association's spokesman, said that had Kalju not sent Järva into the game, the team would only have received a fine instead of losing three points.
The team's sports director, Sergei Terehhov, who retired from the professional game recently, having won 94 caps for the national team, said it was his mistake, and he will apologize to the team.
The annulment means that last year's top two teams both began with losses in the first round, as FC Levadia was beaten 0-1 by Paide in Tallinn.