Coca Cola Mir Iqbal Hussain Trophy

I went to the championship match of the Mir Iqbal Husain Trophy. It's the national youth U-16 tournament. It happened to be held at a pretty nice stadium near my apartment in Gurgaon and our Dentsu sports team decided to go at the invitation of my good friend and AIFF Marketing Head Sukhi Singh (all pictured to the right). My fiance, Vanita, was in town and fortunately she was able to come as well which made it the perfect combination: Friends, Fiance and Football. 

The first thing I noticed pulling up to the stadium was how much security there was. I never thought so many security guards were needed for a youth match but I guess anything can happen at any time.  I walked in and there were about a thousand people in attendance which is not bad for a weekday afternoon. Most of the people were kids and, from the buses outside, I could tell that they were brought in by their school.  Great idea by AIFF.

There was decent talent and the team that won, Jharkhand, received an all expenses paid trip to South Africa for the World Cup. Not bad. But what I was most intrigued by was the following:
  1. The amazing half time show which was a catchy traditional Indian dance (pictured)
  2. The endless line of speakers during the awards ceremony (I think the Janitor even got a few words in). 
  3. The amount of support that title sponsor Coca Cola provided this tournament
We all headed to lunch after the match with a feeling that the future was bright for football in India....

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