Inter-village football in Goa is very unique and
is hard to find elsewhere in India. Inter-village football played a big part in
producing quality footballers and contributed immensely to Goan football in the
seventies and eighties, if not earlier. Is it still as relevant as
before? If not, do we need to introspect and make necessary changes?
On Goa Liberation Day, the 19th of December 2023 I had the fortune to attend the
finals of the inter-village tournament organised by Guardian Angel SC, in
memory of late Fr. Gervasio Pinto. Who is Gervasio Pinto? For the unawares, Fr
Pinto happens to be the founder member of Guardian Angel SC and the then
principal of the Guardian Angel High school in the seventies. It was Fr. William
Robert Lyons, a British priest, who introduced
Football in Goa in 1883. Since then, no one can deny the fact that several other
priests have actively promoted football in the villages all over Goa, for which they
have not received due recognition.
In Curchorem, popularly known as Sanvordem in the seventies, it was the late Fr. Gervasio Pinto who promoted football in a big way. Guardian Angel High school had boarders mostly from Salcete and it was compulsory for them to play football at the Figueiredo Ground which was about a kilometre away from the school, many thanks to the Figueiredo family for the kind gesture of donating the land to Guardian Angel High School. Seeing them play regularly was what inspired and motivated many of us those days. I was eleven years old when Guardian Angel Sports Club was established in 1972 and within another six years at the age of seventeen, I had the opportunity to play for the club in the Senior Division organised by the Goa Football Association. Thanks to the late Fr Gervasio Pinto, Guardian Angel High School and Guardian Angel Sports Club excelled in the game of Football. Thanks to the President of Guardian Angel SC, Mr. Jhoncy Fernandes, being actively supported by the Currchorem MLA Mr. Nilesh Cabral, the organisation of the inter-village tournament by Guardian Angel SC, is a fitting tribute to late Fr. Gervasio Pinto, the then beloved principal of the school and the founder member of the Guardian Angel SC. The club, having completed fifty years in 2022 and presently playing in the Goa Professional League, is a matter of great pride to all the residents of Curchorem and Sanvordem.
For me watching the finals brought back fond memories.
So much has changed over the
years, the well-decorated stage, the live music, the colourful flags all
around, the beautiful individual and
team trophies, but unfortunately nothing seems to have changed on two important fronts. The
playing surface has not changed since my playing days in the late seventies. Being
a hard ground, one requires good skills to play controlled and attractive football
at the Figueiredo Ground. I was disappointed to see that it’s not just the infrastructure
which has not changed over the years but football too, dished out by the two
finalists: Guardian Angel SC and Curtorim Gymkhana. The players failed to
control the ball thus losing possession very easily. Scoring goals is an art requiring quick
thinking, good timing and shooting with awareness of the goalposts. The players lacked the
composure and skill, failing to score and the game ended in a draw which had to
be decided via the tie breaker in favour of Guardian Angel SC.
Inter-village tournaments should be a platform for young
players to showcase their talent and grow in confidence on the path to
Professional Football. For this to happen, there has to be more discipline, both
from the organisational side, as well as from the teams participating in the
tournaments. A team arriving late is a norm rather than an exception.
The duration of play is very important for the development of the players. The
minimum duration of a match should not be less than 70, if not more, as per the
GFA Private Tournament Rules. But that remains only on paper most of the time.
Moreover, the grounds are much smaller in size than the standard ground of play
i.e. 115 X 74 yards recommended for professional football. With shorter duration and smaller grounds, the players are thus deprived of playing
adequately, both with and without the ball, which hampers their growth. As such, many a time after playing
inter-village football, the players and teams go home with a false
sense of satisfaction of having played
well but when faced with tougher opponents on a
standard field of play and duration of 90 minutes, they will realise that they have not progressed. Therefore, if not the infrastructure, at least the duration of the inter-village matches should not be compromised. It’s time to be more disciplined in organising inter-village tournaments and this needs to be done with the objective of developing the players in mind.
According to me, the Referees have a big role to play in maintaining
discipline among the organizers, as well as the teams participating in
inter-village tournaments, so far as the duration of the match is concerned. GFA should pay more attention to the duration of play reported by the
Referees in their match reports. Organisers who do not adhere to the minimum duration of
70 minutes as per the Private Tournament Rules should be sanctioned with fines and repeat offenders could even be denied
permission to conduct inter-village tournaments. There is no substitute for
discipline, if we are to progress in the game of football. To improve the
quality of play, it's time the inter-village teams engage a qualified coach, even
if it is a minimum D License. Players coming together just before or on the day
of the match, with a senior player acting as a guide and coach, is not enough
if we are to progress and lift up our level of play. Prior planning, execution
and post-mortem of the matches played are the essentials of modern football. In GFA, we have a well-qualified Technical
Coordinator in Mariano Dias and further we have one of the best Technical Committees
ever, with Mr Savio Medeira as its Chairman, Mr Armando Colaco and Derrick
Pereira among the other members. I am sure they will play a big role in introducing
coach education, thus bringing in the much required awareness and demands of
modern football in the inter-village games.
Further, it is important for players to develop their individual
skills. All top players are known to be
practicing beyond the team training sessions, to improve their individual
skills in trapping, passing, shooting, heading and set pieces. Very often we
talk about Goa’s glorious past and the individual brilliance of the players of
the sixties, seventies and eighties! They excelled because besides team training, they practiced individually with devotion,
discipline and hunger for success which unfortunately, is missing among our
youth.