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A West Belfast football club has hit out at a dissident Republican group who questioned them playing against a PSNI team.

St James' Swifts ladies side played the PSNI’s ladies team at New Forge Lane on Wednesday night.

Dissident Republican group Saoradh said that a poster calling for support for the team revealed a ‘deeper issue at play which must be challenged by Republicans’.

They requested that the club 'reconsider its association with the RUC'.

Club player Joseph McCall described it as a "disgrace".

He added: “I have my own personal reasons and not once would I reject playing a league game against the PSNI."

Saoradh said on Facebook: "The British crown forces are directed by British military intelligence who are actively engaged in a campaign to destroy Nationalist and Republican communities and have been since the early 1970s.”

It went on: “Any group structured within our community that is truly dedicated to the development of the community by tackling youth alienation and despair through community association and positive activities is to be commended in its sterling work.

“We do not aim to criticise the committee of St James’s Swifts football club because, as political activists, we know how difficult it is to spend every day in the community in the hope of making a difference.

“St James’s club is making a positive difference in the lives of many young people in West Belfast through sport.

“We would though request that the club reconsider its association with the RUC and in doing so takes into consideration the history of collusion and its impact on our community.

“We ask those who genuinely strive to empower our communities to reconsider any liaison they may have with the British crown forces and to instead build an inclusive pathway for all in our community towards success - in the hope of delivering us all from the awful socio-economic effects of partition and the intelligence led political policing employed to enforce it.”

Player Joseph McCall, 23, told Belfast Live: “I think it is a disgrace.

“People are bringing their own political ideologies and agendas that suit themselves into sport.

“I have my own personal reasons and not once would I reject playing a league game against the PSNI.

“It’s business as usual in my eyes and in the eyes of the girls that play for our ladies team.

“Those statuses on Facebook put a lot of pressure on the girls, and on the club no one likes to be intimidated like that - especially not a girl who has just started playing football for the first time.

“We at St James have over 280 registered players and a lot more than that supporters who are behind the group.

“These people behind that Facebook need to keep our club, the sport of football, and the innocent people of St James’ out of their propaganda.

“This club plans to move forward with new pitches, new teams and to strive to the best we can - to represent West Belfast at the highest level and give kids a proper chance through sport.”

The tie finished one-all.