ISL SOCCER FINAL MINUS GOA.
Ater its ignominious exit from the 1982 World Cup soccer tournament with their most disastrous defeat from Italy coached by their foot-ballcrat team Manager Eanzo Berzot where their super star forward Paulo Rossi scored one of the most magnificent hat-tricks in the history of World soccer against the mighty Brazilian squad of which type Braizil never produced earlier even during Pele’s era though Pele was genious on the soccer field, the great Team Manager of Brazil Tele Santana after his team was ousted from that tourney by Italy, lamented saying “we had everything in our favour except luck which favoured the Italians”, till they won the final. This was exactly what has happened two days back in the semi-final of ISL tourney for Goa where inspite of playing such a wonderful soccer some
When the then mighty soccer team recruited me for their team SESA GOA as a defender when I was still schooling at St. Joseph’s High School Arpora, their Coach Mr. Iqbal who was the only Coach in Goa then from Patiala qualified, while testing my efficiency on the first day, gave me the first test of shooting the Panalty kick inspite of knowing that I am a defender but was satisfied after I attained the success.
Yesterday it was very disastrous to see FC Goa’s stalwarts one after the other failing in their aims however, I don’t castigate those who failed in converting their spot kicks either during the first five penalties or during the sudden kill. Even the highly successful spot kick takers in the World namely Brazilian Socrates and Zico, French Platini, Argentinian Maradona and during my time in Goa, Socurro our left back at Vasco to cite a few relevant examples. The great Socrates who was Doctor when he played for Brazil and most expert in converting the penalty in the world, when he failed in converting penalty for Brazil, said: It is agonising to make the players to kick the ball into the net from the spot kick after playing for regular 90 minutes plus another 30 minutes extra time. It is difficult for any player to concentrate on penalty after playing 90 + 30 exhaustive minutes. In such a situation, neither your legs do not move properly nor your mind.
All said and done, I must confess after watching all the previous tournaments from the beginning, this year’s edition was most wonderful and highly advanced in soccer though none was there having the experience of World Cup. But almost all the foreign recruits indicated their calibre and the development of this game in their respective countries and clubs where they play their soccer. First time it was shown how the game opens from both the flanks, how the goalkeeping has improved, how the Brazilian mode of short passing is implemented and so many other tecnics and tactics. The only drawback was the poor refereeing that was handled by those who lacked proper knowledge of laws and implementations. Most of them suffered from inferiority complex especially when they blow their whistles for any infringement by the foreigners. Such a poor state of refereeing was not seen in Europe, South America and elsewhere. Besides, the stupidity of the Benchers by shouting at the referees and other players was beyond my comprehension.
I am sure henceforth Indian players will have better opportunities to learn better ways of playing better soccer in the midst of their colleagues from other parts of the World.
A.Veronica Fernandes.