Indian children train & play in Barcelona

Premier India Football Academy (PIFA) organized their 30^th Champions Tour from 15-25 May 2013 to Barcelona. This being their 10^th year.

The camp was open to children between 10-18 years of all abilities. The camp is designed to develop children into better players, understand the diet & healthy habits of professional players, to understand the Spanish culture and to make new friends.

The participants were trained by Catalunya’s UEFA licensed coach Antonio Sánchez, one of the most qualified technical professional from the Spanish Catalunya football youth academy and assisted by  coach’s Angel Di Maria and Angel Micah at the reputed Hristo Stoichkov Academy in Barcelona.

The players were trained tactically on the Barcelona and Spanish formation and explained the principles employed by Pep Guardiola during his time with FC Barcelona.

The children got a tour of Nou Camp and the museum,  all were in awe of the silver ware  especially the FIFA Golden Boot 1994 belonging to Barca legend Hristo Stoichkov and Messi’s  four FIFA Ballon d'Or.

The following night they watched FC Barcelona beat  Real Valladolid 2-1 at Nou Camp. The match was followed by celebrations as FC Barcelona lifted the La Liga trophy for the 22nd time. The club captain Carles Puyol  let the team manager Tito Vilanova and team mate Eric Abidal, who have both been battling cancer this season, to lift the trophy, this was followed by fireworks.

This year the children also got to participate in the Pentecostes tournament held in the beach town of Lloret, in two age groups that was the  U15 & U17.  There were over 125 academy teams from all over Europe most of them being Germans that participated. The players were awarded a medal each.

All campers were awarded a camp certificate and a football. Talented campers have been invited to play for the PIFA teams.

The next  PIFA Champions Tour is to Barcelona on 18 June 2013. Call 98209 68365 for details.

A Football tournament to save Colaba back garden.

Aadhar Pratisthan organised a children’s football tournament to help save the Colaba backgarden from redevelopment.

The Colaba backgarden has been the hub for South Mumbai and Indian football, it has produced top Club, National & International football players like International player Mr Bandya Kakade to the recent youth International player Harshad Meher, it is also home to FIFA referee Walter Pereira .

The garden is a grass root training facility for schools such as Campion, St Annes, Fort Convent, Holy Name, Scholar, Colaba Municipal School as well as  some clubs  the famous one being PIFA Colaba FC. It is place for children to come together, socialise and enjoy their play time in a safe and healthy environment.

The Colaba Junior Football Championship tournament which was supported by PIFA Colaba FC had over 1000 children either to participate or watch these 32 matches. Thirty two teams had registered for the 9 a side knock out format tournament. The sole purpose of this tournament was to bring about awareness of the potential threat of plans to build a swimming pool and parking lot in the only public football garden in Colaba area.

The final match was played between PIFA Colaba FC and Oscar Foundation had dignitaries such as Mr Bandiya Kakade, Mr Souter Vaz (WIFA – Hon Sec), Mr Surinder Karkera (Founder of Bipin Memorial), Mr Akhil Ansari, Mr Faroukh Ahmed, Arshad Hussain and Shabbirbhai all football personalities.

PIFA Colaba FC won the tournament beating Oscar Foundation 2-0. Campion lifted the third place.

Pratamesh Kasare from PIFA Colaba team was adjudged the Best Player of the tournament, he won a cycle. The other winners were Rahul Pandey – Best Defender, Akash Jadhav – Best Striker, Arjun Mehra – Best Midfielder, Virdhan Chavan – best Goal Keeper, all of them won a mobile phone.

Mr Krishan Pawle, President of Aadhar Pratistan and the organiser of the Colaba Junior Football Championship 2011 had this to say “The Colaba back garden is a community football centre for developing and nurturing young football players, many of them go onto play for the state and country and many make a livelihood playing for clubs.  It is the only public football ground in the Colaba area, we have to save the Colaba back garden”