Libya Premier League to play key round abroad for first time ever

Libya's football federation will host the final stage of the country's Premier League outside the country in a bid to boost its profile, BBC Sport Africa reported Wednesday.

The location of the matches has yet to be decided, a football federation chair said, but they are set to begin in early July.

"The decision came as a step from us to market the Libyan League externally and bring it back to the spotlight," Adel al-Awjali, chairman of the Libyan Football Federation's competitions committee, told BBC Sport Africa.

The move was welcomed by the internationally recognised Government of National Unity - including Prime Minister Abdul Hamid Dbeibeh, who has allocated 5 million Libyan dinars ($1 million) for the players' travel and accommodation costs.

The league has suffered multiple interruptions since an armed rebellion toppled dictator Colonel Muammar Gaddafi in 2011 and the civil war that followed.

The political crisis has caused sports infrastructure - including football stadiums - to be neglected although some of the grounds have been undergoing maintenance. 

Games abroad would give the chance for domestic players to compete in higher-quality stadiums, al-Ajwali said, and aid the national team in their bid to qualify for the 2023 Africa Cup of Nations.

Libya's national team were banned from playing on home soil in 2014, the year full-blown civil war broke out in the country.

The ban was lifted in February 2021, with the team playing their first international match back in Libya in the city of Benghazi a month later.