Live India, Love Football

According to the dictionary, auspicious means “conducive to success; favorable” or “attended by good fortune; prosperous.”   And ever since I moved to India, I’ve been hearing this word “auspicious” being used quite often. For example, someone may say, “that time of the year is an auspicious time to get married” or “it is considered auspicious to give 1 rupee more when giving cash gifts to someone for an auspicious occasion.”  I used to feel that this was all superstition and primarily based on a series of anecdotes passed on from generation to generation however lately my belief system around the concept of something being “auspicious” has started to evolve…all thanks to Facebook. It’s not that I saw an inspirational video on auspicious-ness or read a life-changing blog post, no, it is thanks to Facebook’s memories notification which I happened to click on a few days ago.   Post clicking, I was taken through a series of images from the past nine years and rea...

I remember that day clearly. It is the 5 th of January, 2017 and I am in the DSK Group Company Toyota Innova being chauffeured to the PYC Hindu Gymkhana located in the heart of Pune. I’m excited, yet slightly nervous as today is my first press conference as CEO of I-League club DSK Shivajians FC. About thirty members of the press are expected to hear from and ask questions of myself, DSK Shivajians FC Owner, Shirish Kulkarni, DSK Shivajians FC Head Coach, Dave Rogers, and a few of our senior team players. I listen to a guided meditation on the drive to calm any remaining nerves and after forty-five minutes of meandering through the always reliable Pune traffic, I arrive at the Gymkhana quickly stopping into the restroom to ensure that my tailored DSK Shivajians FC suit didn’t get too wrinkled from the drive over.   I walk into the A-2 Hall on the 3 rd floor and notice that the room is empty of media which doesn’t concern me given that there is still thirty mi...