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Our Correspondent
Imphal, June 29 (EMN): Football fans perched atop bamboo trees to watch the final match of a local football tournament in Manipur after the playground was packed with about 23,000 people beyond the field's capacity.
The incident took place during the final match of the 12th edition of Tentha Khongbal Welfare Association (TKWA) tournament, popularly known as TKWA trophy, at Tentha village under Thoubal district on June 26.
The final was played between Sana FC Thoubal and G5 Heirok. However, the latter won the trophy by beating the former in a penalty shootout.
Sharing the video wherein the football fans were watching the final match atop bamboo which went viral among social media users, the state chief minister N Biren Singh in a Facebook post wrote, “Test of natural gallery”.
Apart from the cash prize of INR 1 lakh for the winner, the unique feature of the TKWA trophy is that it is a well organised tournament status with wide publicity, presence of Manipur celebrities and colourful traditional dance performance prior to the final match. The tournament itself has been popular since its previous editions because of the way it was organised.
When contacted, Organising Secretary of the TKWA trophy, Ajanta Moirangthem said, “In fact we’re trying our best to maintain the state’s status of a sports powerhouse by organising the TKWA tourney since 2009. This time, 68 teams approached for participation in the tournament but we had to filter down to 32 teams as per our criteria”.
The criteria include first come first serve, seriousness of the team and assurance of the complete team players, he said.
As a result, some of the teams such as Pointrex Imphal could not take part in the month-long football tournament, usually organised in April every year.
Football player, Angom Niruchand from Awang Sekmai, who missed to watch the June 26 final match said, “We really missed the final match. We returned home without even having a glance of the match, so we will start early next year”.
Manipur has contributed 43 footballers for different premier football clubs of the country in the Indian Super League, India’s unrivalled football championship. Ten women footballers from Manipur are in the national team camp, Preparing for the AFC Women’s Asian Cup India 2022.
Earlier, the FIFA U-17 World Cup squad of India had eight players from Manipur.