An under-17 football tournament drew players and supporters from Greenwood Sonata, Greenfield Ambition and Uttara to the flood-lit football field of Greenwood Elements, New Town where youths of the four neighbouring housing complexes of Action Area IID locked horns.
The quadrangular tournament was held in league knockout format with 15 minutes in each half and a 6+5 squad, with rolling substitutes. The top three teams played the playoff matches over the weekend and Greenfield Ambition, along with Uttara, reached the Sunday final.
In the first half of the final match, Uttara seemed to have had a slight edge over their lacklustre rivals. The players from Ambition lacked coordination and that became evident when at one point two players from the same team chased the ball together and almost collided. Uttara were playing beautiful passing football with all of their players showboating while the Ambition players focused more on long passes and long range efforts, which are extremely hard to score of in any mini-goal format as this tournament.
Game on
The runners-up team from Uttara. Pictures by Aranyak Mojumdar
As the second half began, Ambition looked like they had been charged during the break. Shubhargo Sinha from Ambition showed some wonderful footwork and positioning. Chitrak Saha was holding the fort for Uttara at the other end, which helped his team manage to keep the scoresheet 0-0 at the end of the regulation time. The clash between Uttara and Ambition was turning out to be as much of a clash between Shubhargo and Chitrak at the individual level.
With both sides playing well and neither sparing an inch to the opposition, the match went into a tie-breaker and then sudden death. But even after all the players were done taking shots (from in front of one goalpost to the open goal at the other end, without a goalkeeper), the sudden death had to be restarted as all the shots kept going wide. Finally a shot from Ambition, taken by their captain Vedant Sharan, went in and all eyes were on the next shot from Uttara. Chitrak’s deciding shot went tantalizingly close but swerved slightly to hit the bar. Ambition players and supporters erupted in joy, running to a side of the goal to celebrate.
The delight on their faces was in stark contrast to the downcast faces of the Uttara players. “It was plain bad luck. Both my penalty shots hit the bar, so did Chitrak’s final shot,” said Farhan Khan, captain of Uttara.
Vedant, the Ambition captain, was candid in admitting that luck had favoured his team with so many shots of the opposition hitting the bar. “Uttara had defeated us in the league stage. It was a chance to take revenge for us. That is what I told my teammates in the huddle before the match,” he said.
“We were running low on motivation after losing the first match of the tournament to Uttara but a win in our second match against Greenwood Sonata boosted our morale. Since then, we never looked back. This is likely to be my last tournament as I have to start preparing for medical entrance exams. For now, I am relishing the feeling of being the tournament champions,” Shubhargo smiled.
Chitrak Saha won the medal for the top goal scorer of the tournament with three goals, including one in the penalty shoot-out. “We do have a ground in Uttara but there are no goalposts or lights like they have here,” he reflected. The youngest players in the team were no more than 12. “We overheard the coach telling someone that our team was too young to compete with older teams. That made us determined to do well,” said Swetangshu Padhi and Shaurya Shukla of Uttara, who are yet to get into their teens.
Ambition’s Vedant, whose Board exams start from April 26, received the Player of the Tournament trophy while Ritam Saha from Uttara bagged the Goalkeeper of the Tournament award. “My parents were pretty cool about letting me play if I could manage studies,” Vedant smiled.
Behind the scene
Chitrak Saha set to kick the ball at a decisive moment during the final
Vedant Sharan, player of the tournament and the victorious captain of Ambition
Dhrubajyoti Basak, president of Greenwood Elements, who also provided running commentary of the matches on the microphone, credited the youngsters for the success of the tournament. “Everything from the idea of the tournament to the rules came from the boys. Our association’s sports body has only helped them with the logistics. They came to us with the proposal and we only backed them up,” he said.
Ayushman Basak, the captain of Greenwood Elements, recalled his teammate Ayush Banerjee being approached by his friend, Prithviraj Dubey of Greenwood Sonata. “They asked us to play and also sought to use our ground,” Ayushman said. Residents senior to them had played in tournaments at the NKDA stadium but this was a first tournament for the teenagers. “We had played other complexes only in bilateral matches so far,” said teammate Ayush Sinha.
The youngsters from Greenwood Sonata, who combined their head and heart to make the tournament happen, were delighted with its success. “We got the idea that we could organise a tournament and compete for a trophy. Our proposal was taken up by Greenwood Elements. A big thanks to them for sponsoring the trophies, medals and even the match referees. We didn’t expect such clean games. There were hardly any fouls. We look forward to organising more such tournaments in future,” said Prithviraj.
In what ways other than sport can neighbourly bonds be formed in New Town? Write to The Telegraph Salt Lake, 6 Prafulla Sarkar Street, Calcutta 700001 or email to saltlake@abp.in