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3. Misuse of Salt Lake Stadium
Concerts have got preference over football matches at Kolkata’s Salt Lake Stadium
Kolkata is often referred to as the Mecca of Indian football but on the evidence of 2013 it doesn’t seem so as the beautiful game was shown total disrespect in at least three instances. Most notably the opening ceremony of the IPL (cricket) was allowed to take place at the Salt Lake Stadium and that caused considerable damage to its artificial turf while teams were forced to play at the Kalyani Stadium.
But let’s not blame cricket for this because eight months after that IPL concert, East Bengal organised a cultural program on the same venue while an I-League fixture was moved to the Barasat Stadum. Most recently a local league match between East Bengal and Mohammedan Sporting was postponed because the surroundings of the stadium was hosting a cultural fair and police didn’t want to risk the security of the people by having a derby clash simultaneously. Surely this can’t be happening with the under-17 World Cup on the horizon.
