World class grassroots football training in NE

Our Correspondent Imphal, Dec. 21 (EMN): In a move to facilitate the country to play in the FIFA world cup in the coming years, Tata Trusts has started to open world class training and development opportunities which is one of the biggest in the country in terms of its outreach program, for young (both boys and girls) footballers in North East India. Under this initiative Tata Trusts in collaboration with state governments of Mizoram and Manipur is planning to provide world class football training and development opportunities to 4500 children between 6-14 years across 90 Grassroots Football Centres (GFC) as part of its primary level intervention, according to Biswanath Sinha, head of sports, Tata Trusts. In the second level intervention, talented children stationed at the newly developed Centre of Excellence (CoE) were given world-class training so that some of them can be sent to the main Athletic de Madrid Football Academy in Madrid (Spain) for further training 3 more years, Biswanath said. In case of Mizoram, the training had already been started for at its 60 GFCs in Mizoram since the last three years while in case of Manipur training has been started at 25 GFCs(out of 30 GFCs) only recently. Each GFC will accommodate 50 children including girls. “The main objective is to identify the young talents at an early age so that we can nurture them on time to compete in world arena,” says Biswanath. “Because here, we come to realise the hidden talents of our footballers only when they attain 15-16 years.” On Dec. 17, the Manipur government signed a Memorandum of Understanding with Tata Trusts to set up a CoE to provide the best of football facilities and guidance besides education to some selected children. Manipur Chief Minister Biren Singh accompanied by sports minister Letpao Haokip both football enthusiast and Tata Trust senior advisor Burzis S Taraporevala also present during the signing of the MoU. A team of Tata Trusts inspected existing infrastructures in and around Imphal to start the programme by December end or early part of January next year. Currently 40 talented children were provided intensive training at the newly set up CoE at Aizawl since the last 9 months. According to S Maniratan,a football coach in Manipur, around 60 footballers from Manipur alone playing in the Indian-league and Indian Super League while 300 others are playing for premier football clubs including central security forces etc.