The Freedom QJ League 2026 pre-season press conference was held

The speakers were Timur Turlov, Chief Executive Officer of Freedom Holding Corp. and Chairman of the Board of Trustees of Freedom QJ League, Aleksandr Keplin, Acting Secretary General of the Kazakhstan Football Federation, and League President Rokhus Shokh.

In the opening video, the League summed up the results of its first three years of work. During this period, its competitions engaged more than 3,000 young footballers and football center specialists.

Freedom QJ League was the first to bring conditions close to professional championships into junior football. The competitions are held in a weekly round-robin format with home and away matches, visiting teams are accommodated in comfortable hotels, and coaches of participating clubs have access to advanced digital tools.

At the same time, all major organizational costs of the competitions are covered by the project’s general partner, Freedom Holding Corp.

Over the past three years, the sports analytics division of Freedom QJ League has held a total of 17 training seminars for coaches in different regions of the country and has also launched the “Player of the Future” and “Coach of the Future” programs.

The League’s website features complete statistics for every player and every match, while the organization’s in-house digital platform for coaches, FF Manager, has gained broad recognition in the professional community and won numerous awards. The League is now actively introducing “smart cameras” into both training and competition processes in partnership with Freedom Telecom and BigBro.

Great attention is also paid to the media and marketing side of junior football. Over three years, all 997 matches were broadcast live, and 672 of them featured professional commentators.

Matches are filmed with at least four professional cameras, and many games are shown on national TV channels. The total number of match views over three years stands at around 3,500,000.

The League’s official platforms continue to grow as well. More than 70,000 football fans follow Freedom QJ League across different platforms. In order to boost the motivation of clubs’ media teams and marketers, the League also runs a media and marketing championship.

In his welcome speech, Timur Turlov emphasized that the League is entering the new season in the best shape in its history. The key indicators clearly reflect this.

“But what matters is not the numbers themselves, but what stands behind them. We can see that the growth of QJ League has been organic and consistent. Thanks to the work of a talented team led by Rokhus Shokh, the project has gained the necessary momentum and gone beyond the scope of a bold experiment.

QJ League has now become a living and highly technological platform where new sports stars are discovered. It is a source of expertise both for youth football and for the sports industry as a whole. All this incredibly inspires us to keep developing further and to move Kazakh youth football forward with even greater confidence,” he added.

The Chief Executive Officer of Freedom Holding Corp. thanked all fans who watch the League’s matches and believe in Kazakhstan’s youth, and also reminded the audience that many young players are already actively signing contracts with professional teams.

“At the same time, it is important to remember that the development of youth football is not only about sport. Looking at it more broadly, it is also about building a healthy generation for our country. It creates new career opportunities and social mobility for our young people.

Football has always been and remains an important part of Kazakhstan’s culture and one of the key components of the modern society that we are building together with you.

We will continue developing our project on the basis of the experience we have accumulated. We will introduce new ideas and formats. Our goal is to be a modern standard not only for Kazakhstan, but for the entire region. I wish the entire League team good luck and success in the new season!” Timur Turlov concluded.

“For three years now, our League has been developing while serving as a social lift for Kazakh boys and girls. And I mean not only footballers, but also talented and promising specialists who, thanks to Freedom QJ League, continue to grow, gain experience, and together with us contribute to the future of football in Kazakhstan already today.

The upcoming season will be the first in the League for hundreds of boys born in 2012 — this is the first generation that will spend four years within our ecosystem. I wish them, and everyone else, good luck!” said Rokhus Shokh.

At the press conference, the League also announced the continuation of cooperation with its key partners — the multinational financial corporation Mastercard and the official distributor of the Chinese brand Changan in Kazakhstan, which is part of Astana Motors.

The partnership between Freedom QJ League and Mastercard began in 2024. At that time, the League and one of the world’s largest multinational financial corporations carried out a number of joint initiatives of both an entertainment and a social nature, the main one being the first football festival for girls in Pavlodar.

The cooperation continued, with Mastercard represented at all key events of the League. In addition, the company became the naming partner of two regular individual awards in the girls’ tournament — Player of the Week and Goal of the Week.

The League’s cooperation with Changan Kazakhstan was first announced ahead of the 2025 season.

The infrastructure of Changan Kazakhstan and Astana Motors was repeatedly used for joint projects, while the premium partner’s interactive zones were present at all key events. Special individual awards were also established: Changan MVP of the Match within QJL All Star and Changan MVP of the Season.

The League then introduced new strategic partnerships for the upcoming season. Cooperation agreements with Freedom QJ League were signed by Freedom Bank, the UNICEF office in Kazakhstan, and SCAT Airlines.

Last season, Freedom QJ League and Freedom Bank announced the launch of a support program for the League’s young footballers.

More than 2,000 players will be able to receive Freedom Bank cards with an exclusive football design. For every minute spent on the pitch in League matches, holders of these cards will receive a bonus of 75 tenge in Freedom’s investment currency.

This is the first project of its kind in Kazakh sport. In addition to this support, footballers will also attend lectures on financial literacy.

The key areas of partnership between the League and UNICEF will include an awareness campaign on mental health and healthy lifestyles, the development of educational materials, and the organization of joint events.

Cooperation with SCAT Airlines is aimed at optimizing one of the League’s key areas of work — organizing logistics for visiting teams.

Over three seasons, teams participating in round-robin competitions with home and away matches made more than 1,500 trips, 980 of which were air journeys. At the same time, the number of tournaments and matches under the Freedom QJ League umbrella continues to grow every year.

That is why the availability of convenient flights is an important factor in creating a stable and comfortable competition calendar for all participating teams. The partnership with SCAT Airlines will allow the League to significantly simplify the solution of logistical challenges throughout a busy football season.

At the end of the presentation, the speakers of the press conference answered journalists’ questions.

The first round of Freedom QJ League 2026 will begin on April 18. On that day, the League’s 1,000th match will take place in Kyzylorda — to mark the occasion, the game between Kaisar and Tobol will be held in the atmosphere of a large-scale football celebration.

For the first time, teams in the U-15 age category will take part in the League. Teams in the U-18, U-17, and U-16 age groups will also continue to compete within the League system. In total, the six tournaments of the upcoming season will involve around 2,000 boys and girls from 18 regions of Kazakhstan.