Last week Gibraltar were confirmed as hosts for 2019, following the withdrawal of Menorca, and they subsequently announced that football was not one of their chosen sports, due to lack of facilities and size of the tournament.
The loss of football for 2019 has resulted in Ynys Môn staking a claim to host football as a trial tournament ahead of 2025, when they hope to be confirmed as Games hosts for their first time in their history.
Ynys Môn football co-ordinator Gareth Perry said: ‘It makes sense; we have been provisionally accepted for 2025 and there is a further two years work before we are formally confirmed, so we’d like to have a trial run with the football tournaments in 2019 because there will be none in Gibraltar.
‘Hearing that Gibraltar had excluded football was a huge disappointment to us; we had a good build up to the Jersey Games and we were happy with the tournament in Jersey and we want to keep that momentum going with Gotland next and, hopefully, Ynys Môn two years after.
‘This is a great opportunity for us to have a trial run ahead of the 2025 Games and it has the backing of everyone here.
‘Our Island Games Association are happy that we look to roll it out in full and I hope the other islands will come support it.
‘We’re doing a feasibility study now; the feedback from everyone here is to go for it and I don’t see many stumbling blocks.
‘It will not be an official Island Games, so it may be a bit more relaxed and we hope to run it around the same time as the Games usually take place; in late June or early in July.
‘Venues will not be an issue because we have plenty of them and we have accommodation across the bridge at Bangor University.’
Perry said that Ynys Môn recently staged a gymnastics tournament – the Inter Island International Games for IIGA members – and that cycling may possibly look to host events in 2019 due them also being provisionally dropped from the Gibraltar Games.
