Who was the only Indian
to score a hat-trick in the Olympic? In the year 2000, Calcutta resident Ramesh
Dubey would have won rupees one crore if he could answer the question asked by
the big B-Amitabh Bachchan on the Kaun Banega Crorepati show (KBC).He opted out and lost 50 lakhs because he did not know the answer. Prior to this, the majority of Indian did not know that it was
none other than Neville Stephen J D’Souza, a Goan who died on the !6th
march, 1980 in Mumbai, Maharashtra, his
adopted state.
Goa is known as the
land of sun, sea, sand and football. In the game of football, Goa has won all
that is up for grabs in Indian football, from schools championship to the
senior national ie the Santosh Trophy. Besides this Goan Clubs, Dempo SC, Salgaocar
FC, Churchill Bros have all won the I League, with Dempo being the pick of the
lot with five titles. Therefore, Goa rightly had the tag of being ‘Numero Uno’
of Indian football.
Goa, being a Portuguese
colony, naturally had the influenced of the Portuguese way of life. And needless
to say, the Portuguese being very passionate about football, Goans took to
football as fish takes to water. But contrary to assumption, it wasn’t the
Portuguese who introduced football in Goa. In 1883, reverend Fr Willaim Roberts
Lyons, an Irish priest, introduced football in the carriculam of Christian
education at Siolim,Goa. From there, other schools picked up the game and
thanks to the clergy, the game soon spread all over Goa
Goa was liberated in
the year 1961 but Goa Football Association was founded in during the Portuguese
regime in 1959, as Associação de
Futebol de Goa, with Lt Jaoa Luis Aranha as the first president of the
Association. Goa has seen the emergence of great players over the years with Menino
Figuereido of Salgaocar Sports Club(1963)and
Andrew D’Souza of Vasco Sports Club( 1968) being the two Goan players who
represented the Indian team against the Russian Teams in the sixties.. Therafter,
several other footballers donned Indian colours with distinction with some of
the prominent players being Brahmanand Shankwalker, Nicholas Pereira, Bernard
Pereira, Camilo Gonsalves, Derrick Pereira, Mauricio Afonso,Bruno Coutinho,
Climax Lawrence and Mahesh Gawli. From the above, only two Goan footballers, Brahmanand
Shankwalker and Bruno Coutinho were honoured with the Arjuna Awards by the
government of India.
Every footballer aspires to play for the country and playing the Olympic
Games, the World Cup is the ultimate goal.
Taking this as the yardstick, the achievemenf of two other Goan
footballers who spent their entire
careers in Bombay and represented the country at the Olympic Games, needs to be
eulogised and should be a matter of great pride to all Goans.
A Goan is a Goan, no matter where he
resides. Neville D’souza and Fortunato Franco are the two Goans who may not had
the fortune to play for Goa but their contribution to the Indian team at the
international stage is beyond comparison.
Fortunato Franco hails from Colvale, a village in North Goa. He represented
India from 1959 to 1966 and played the Rome Olympic games in 1960.He was also the
proud member of the Indian team that won gold in the Asian games in 1962 at Jakarta.
Neville D”souza was born in Asagoa, a small village in North Goa from where
his family migrated to Bombay.He represented India in the Olympic Games in 1956 at Melbourne, Australia.
He happens to be the first Asian footballer to have scored a hatrick in the
Olympic Games. Thanks to his exploits on the football field, he won the golden
boot and the Indian team went on to claim the forth place in Melbourne Olmpic
Games,1956.
Surely a fourth place for India and the golden boot for Neville D”Souza in
the Olympic Games is the greatest achievemnet in the annals of Goan and Indian
football history. Therefore he can truly be called the greatest Goan Footballer
of all times. The other olympian Fortunato Franco now resides in Colva,Goa and
was honoured by the Govetment of Goa with the special award of Rs 5,00,000/- in
2010. The contribution of Neville D’Souza has completely been forgotten. GFA
and the Government(GFDC) must recognize the services rendered by Neville
D’Souza and honour him posthumously. It would be also in the fitness of things
to have his statue installed at a very prominent place, in or outside, the very
popular Nehru Stadium, Fatorda,Goa and the ‘Goa State Award for life time
achievement’ for footballers should be named after ‘Neville D’Souza’ instead of
‘Jivadababa Kerkar Award’. Its better late than never.