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Part I of II
The beautiful game in India has its unique stamp to it. Riding the no. 2 status (in terms of popularity), at this stage and within the contours of this diverse state, football has had a one-of-a-kind journey. The recent past of the same witnessed India hosting the Nehru Cup football tournament since the early 80s. Here are some highlights and amazing facts from the time when the host team was rarely the winning team:
- The first edition took place in 1982, in Kolkata. Uruguay, China and South Korea sent their full strength squads. The South Americans beat the Chinese in the finals by a couple of goals. One of the scorers in the finals- Jorge Da Silva, went on to win the golden boot in the Spanish league (top tier) the next season for Real Valladolid!
- The 1984 edition witnessed the full strength squad of Argentina and Poland amongst other teams. India performed admirably well against the Latin American giants and persevered till the 79thminute mark on which they conceded a single goal to lose just 1-0!
| The Argentine scorer against India in 84! |
- China, Soviet Union and Hungary were regulars in the early stages of this historic tournament. Morocco, Yugoslavia, East Germany (Olympic team) and Peru also participated. A very famous Peruvian world cuper- Franco Navarro also graced the subcontinent in 1986.
- The host cities were rotated as follows: cochin in 83, Trivandrum in 86, Kozikode in 87, Silliguri in 1988, Goa (Fatorda stadium in Margao) in 1989 and Chennai in 1993. It wasn’t until 2007 that the tournament got shifted to the capital after it was suspended from 97 to 2007 due to lack of funds.
- The Syrians were called for the first time in 1987 along with Nigeria and the league team of Denmark. The 2007 and the 2009 finalist did not qualify for the final stages back then. An annual event till 89, it was made a biennial one till 97.
- Soviet Union hold the record for the most number of titles(4) while India, Iraq and Hungary have won it twice. China and Romania have used this as an exposure trip for their youth teams.
- India earned a credible draw with the Olympic team of the mighty Poland in 1988. Other noticeable results for India include a goal-less and a two-all draw with Finland and Ghana respectively (in different editions). The match against Ghana was witnessed by 35,000 fans in Cochin (1997) when Bhutia and I.M Vijayan scored for India.
The second spell of this tournament started off in 2007 when Bob Houghton rightly demanded the need for more international games in order to prepare for 2008 AFC Challenge Cup. Things changed from black and white since then and a new look Nehru Cup took place in New Delhi in 2007 against relatively weaker teams (than before). More on that in the next part.
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