India won AFC Challenge Cup 2008

Far away from the hustle and bustle of Olympics and about a single gold medal won by an Indian, the unsung heroes of Indian football piped Tajikistan 4-1 in the final match of AFC Challenge Cup that happened in New Delhi.

The final match was shifted to Ambedkar Stadium, New Delhi as the Gachibowli stadium in Hyderabad turned out to be a paddy field because of the continuous rains that belted in the city. As it is, the city did not deserve to hold the finals as hardly any fans turned up to the stadium to watch the tournament. Contrary to what happened in Hyderabad, the New Delhi stadium was filled with a huge number of well-wishers of Indian football, men and women as well.

There is nothing much to be written about the final match as India were already 3-0 up by 23 minutes through goals of Sunil Chhetri and Baichung Bhutia. Over all the team played with his full potential. Tajikistan too had their chances in the game, but they were too rattled to stage a come back in the match. Our defenders did quite well barring the occasional glitches that led to dangerous counter attacking by the Tajiks. The defense would have been much better, if we had Mahesh Gawli available, who is injured.

The midfielders had better day on the field and i am quite impressed by Meharajuddin Wadoo who came on as a substitute for N.P.Pradeep, who was seen quite rusty in the whole tournament. There is nothing much to talk about Steven Dias; his crosses and spot kicks were the highlight of this tournament. This man has a long way to go. I am still a bit apprehensive in praising Climax Lawrence, though he had a good game as the rest of the team members.

The forward line was quite exemplary yesterday with Chhetri pitching in with a hat-trick. Eventhough I am a Chhetri lover, I criticised him for his performance level in the group stages, but now, i think i will have to re-think on this. He did play very well, held the ball up, had good close control and scored 3 goals and this is a massive achievement for him as he is a shorty, nippy forward. Whatever you may say, Baichung undoubtedly is the trump card of India and he is so lively and remarkably flexible for his age. I hope we will have his service extended till the Asian Cup of 2011.

But I must say, the real hero in this tournament was Subrato Paul for me. He is an outstanding young goal keeper, who will grow in stature in the coming years. He is tall, brave and marvellously acrobatic in the goal. He was very influential through out the tournament and made some splendid saves through out the tournament. He seems to be a very calm and cool customer and i seriously wish that some international scouts pick him up, so that he can have a stint outside the country, which will help him massively.

By winning the AFC Challenge Cup we have sealed a berth in the 2011 Asian Cup happening in Qatar, by then we will have some more talented youngsters to choose from and they will offer serious contention for the current crop of players. Mind you, we have an U-16 team, who have blanked Asian Soccer power houses like Saudi Arabia and South Korea.

The media as always is beating drums for some Phelps & Dhonis who is of no importance to us. It took a bloody two hours for the websites of these illustrious beacons of our society to update and write a few lines about our football teams victory. Neither did i expect anything spectacular from them. There will be no victory parades in open buses, no endowments from the governments but Indian football will rally on; sad to say with a corrupt and inefficient man like Priyaranjan Das Munshi heading the ALL India Football Federation past 20 years for no reason.