Courtesy: Goal.com


Football Players Association Of India Launches The Second Edition Of The IT Futsal Festival In Kolkata

The IT Boys to play with the I-League Stars...

By Vaibhav Agarwal

15-Jun-2010

The Football Players Association of India (FPAI) along with the IT sector are organizing it's second IT Futsal Festival on the Techno India Ground in Sector V in Salt Lake City on Sunday, June 20. The first edition was held back in December 2008 with Sunil Chhetri being the star player at the tournament helping his side win the Cup.

FPAI president Bhaichung Bhutia stated the aim of the tournament is to give the growing IT industry a chance to interact with the football stars.

"Our aim is not only to develop the game at the grass root levels, but it is also to try and interact more with the corporate world", said Bhutia.

"This year, the tournament is being organized during the World Cup because of the interest level of the players during this time will be high. Add to that, there will be more media coverage", adds Bhutia.

Each team would have one professional I-League player in each of the 16 teams to add more zing to the event.

"Since the season has just ended, all the other other players apart from the ones who stay in Kolkata have gone home. This applies to foreign players as well. But we have got big name players from big clubs across the city", Bhaichung ended.

Amongst the sponsorers, Tamal Dasgupta, MD of Webel, said they were happy to be associated with the FPAI.

"Webel is proud to be a sponsor of such an event. It is time that the IT industry of West Bengal get together and have some fun, and there is no better way than the IT Futsal Festival. I wish the event all the success", said Dasgupta.

He also said that his company where ready to provide any sort of help the event needed, and along with the Indian National team Captain, also thanked Mr. Kalyan Kar, MD of Acclaris, who has played a key role in organizing this entire festival.

Thereafter, the groups were made which saw the defending champions Infinity being slotted in Group D while runners-up Descon were part of Group B.

Group A- Ernst and Young, Videocon, Acclaris
Group B- Descon, IXIA, Globsyn
Group C- PwC, DCPCL, Sun Knowledge Systems
Group D- Techno India, Infinity, Praxis

Each team play each other once at th group stages and the winners and the runners-up proceed onto the knockout stages of the tournament.

This was followed by the draw of the star players:

Ernst and Young - Subhashish Roy Choudhary
Videocon - Shilton Paul
Acclaris - Renedy Singh
Descon - Deepak Mondal
IXIA - Basudeb Mondal
Globsyn - Lal Kamal Bhowmick
PwC - Buddhi Ram Tudu
DCPCL - Tushar Rakshit
Sun Knowledge Systems - Ashim Biswas
Techno India - Dulal Biswas
Infinity - Mehtab Hussain
Praxis - Syed Rahim Nabi

In case some of the above mentioned players fail to make it on the day of the event, Satyajit Chatterjee, Shishir Ghosh and the Indian skipper himself would fill the gap.

Videocon announced that the Star Player, whose team wins the tournament, would get a Videocon Plasma TV.

Mr. Sumit Mukherjee, CEO of the FPAI then ended the press conference by thanking all the sponsors and the teams.

"Thank you to Webel and Videocon. Vodafone for being the mobile partners and Goal.com for being the Website partner. Selvel for being the outdoor partner and Khanna Sports, for sponsoring the balls and the trophy. I would also like to thank Bhaichung and his team for all the support. A special mention of Mr. Kalyan Kar, without whom this event would not have been possible, and Techno India, for providing the venue for this event", ended Mr. Mukherjee.

The trophy was then unveiled to the media.


Posted by Luca Ranocchiari --> luca.ranocchiari@futsalplanet.com