There is a saying by Paulo Coelho - " And when you want really something, the universe conspires in helping you to achieve it" in his famous book – The Alchemist. This quote has had a huge impact on me over the past year. There is another quote which I thoroughly believe in – “ Will beats Skill “. Yes, the will to win is the main motivating factor for any Footballer.
The preseason for IITH FC was amazing – we thrashed many teams in the local neighborhood 5-0,6-1, 5-1 etc. But still we had miles to go in terms of the level of competition to match INTER IIT level. This time it was in Roorkee – Our last chance to win the championship. The pass outs ( Carlos, Paki , Yatharath , Pramod, Shyamang , Vindy , Chithransh ) from the last year team left a small dent in the team formation, but luckily we had two incredible additions to the team from my batch- SKM and Bolt. As the potential replacement to Yatharth ( Manas) was injured ,hence my coach moved me to center midfield position where I could see more of the ball. The Bronze medal was a huge motivation for the team and hence there was also huge pressure and expectation on the team. So we had to put in even more hard work than in the past years. Since the arrival of flood lights (thanks to Bindu ) we had longer practice sessions every day , sometimes even extending till 8:30 – 9:00 in the night. We even had morning practice sessions three months before INTER IIT – That’s 4-5 hours of practice a day for three whole months - This is not an easy feat to pull off with the added pressure of placements, acads etc. Of course I was enjoying every moment of it and we still had the FC fire in our hearts but we were also nervous as we felt we did not do enough.
So we set sail to Roorkee – the coldest freak place an IIT could have been built. The December in Hyderabad is moderately cold, but the weather in IIT Roorkee is a freak show compared to Hyderabad. We had no clue that it would mind numbingly cold – the average temperature was around 5 degree Celsius. We luckily bought skin tights along with our jersey to protect ourselves during the matches. The field in IIT R was actually small when compared to our ground, so we had a slight advantage in terms of our defense. The teams in our group were IIT Mandi, IIT Indore and IIT Kanpur and we could never underestimate the power of new IITs , so we had to give our best effort to win the matches.
MATCH #1 vs IIT Mandi
This is the team which I would say the second strongest amongst the newer IITs (after us of course! ). We had beaten them in the quarter finals of the last year’s tournament convincingly 3-1 after them taking the lead. This being said the pressure was on us to rip apart Mandi and also since Mandi had the home weather advantage on us . The kick off was at 3:30 in the afternoon, so we had no problem of mist and the weather was fairly warm which suits our playing condition. The match started and we were slightly nervous and were making wrong passes many a time mainly because it was the first time many in the team are playing in this level. But eventually we did get a hang of it and started becoming comfortable. Around the 30th minute we got a corner after a lot of miss chances. The corner was taken by Shyamboy , it was a beautifully crafted corner ( landing just outside the penalty line). Their defenders missed the header and I was standing near the far post waiting for this exact thing to happen and the ball bounced and was at my reach. I toed the ball and it hit the far post and went into the goal. The next few moments were bliss.
The momentary amount of ecstasy I had then was incomparable to anything I had experienced in my life till now. I started running around the ground in joy with my teammates behind me. It took about 10 minutes for me to calm down and it would have taken more time if not for Akbar sir shouting from the dug-out. It was my first goal for me in INTER IIT level – from a five minute send off to an opening goal – it was all flashing in my mind. It took every ounce of will power to get back in game. The game went fairly with us having a majority of the possession. We however made a small defensive blunder which cost us badly and we ended up drawing the match which we easily should have won.
MATCH #2 vs IIT Kanpur
This was the game I was eagerly waiting for – It was revenge time. We would have met in the third place match in IIT Kharagpur if not for their disqualification. So this time I knew it was payback time for the defeats we had in their hands in the first two INTER IITs at Kanpur and Delhi. I also could never ever forget my send off against them in Delhi. Hence I so wanted to beat these guys very badly to find peace for my ego. This time the kick off was at 11:30 and it was damn cold. We didn’t get the chance to warm up properly and we started off on a bad note giving a penalty to them at the 10th minute. Déjà vu – it was happening all over again I thought. They had such low sportsmanship that they started wasting time so early in the match using throw ins and faking injuries (******).
The match against Indore was supposed to be a cake walk and it was. The only glitch was that the match was scheduled at 8:30 in the morning and it was freaking cold and one could not see beyond 20ft because of the mist. But not to worry as we totally outclassed Indore as we were in altogether new level. This match witnessed one of the marveling performances by a striker in IITH – Navanshu- the Hat Trick hero. All of INTER IIT was taking a look at IITH and he eventually became the most feared striker of INTER IIT 2012.
So again we were the group toppers for the second year in a row. The expectations rose but as again challenges rose with it. The Quarter finals were against IIT Kharapur. They were the favorites for winning the tournament- They had a skill level that is one step higher than all the IITs. Till now our defense and goal keeper were never tested to the limits. So there were severe doubts whether we could handle the might of KGP. Seeing their practice sessions one day left us in awe for the team. But we could never stop to Believe – not after Roorkee!
Contd......... ( Scroll down for Part 2 )
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| Pep talk by Akbar sir before the Match |
So we set sail to Roorkee – the coldest freak place an IIT could have been built. The December in Hyderabad is moderately cold, but the weather in IIT Roorkee is a freak show compared to Hyderabad. We had no clue that it would mind numbingly cold – the average temperature was around 5 degree Celsius. We luckily bought skin tights along with our jersey to protect ourselves during the matches. The field in IIT R was actually small when compared to our ground, so we had a slight advantage in terms of our defense. The teams in our group were IIT Mandi, IIT Indore and IIT Kanpur and we could never underestimate the power of new IITs , so we had to give our best effort to win the matches.
MATCH #1 vs IIT Mandi
This is the team which I would say the second strongest amongst the newer IITs (after us of course! ). We had beaten them in the quarter finals of the last year’s tournament convincingly 3-1 after them taking the lead. This being said the pressure was on us to rip apart Mandi and also since Mandi had the home weather advantage on us . The kick off was at 3:30 in the afternoon, so we had no problem of mist and the weather was fairly warm which suits our playing condition. The match started and we were slightly nervous and were making wrong passes many a time mainly because it was the first time many in the team are playing in this level. But eventually we did get a hang of it and started becoming comfortable. Around the 30th minute we got a corner after a lot of miss chances. The corner was taken by Shyamboy , it was a beautifully crafted corner ( landing just outside the penalty line). Their defenders missed the header and I was standing near the far post waiting for this exact thing to happen and the ball bounced and was at my reach. I toed the ball and it hit the far post and went into the goal. The next few moments were bliss.
The momentary amount of ecstasy I had then was incomparable to anything I had experienced in my life till now. I started running around the ground in joy with my teammates behind me. It took about 10 minutes for me to calm down and it would have taken more time if not for Akbar sir shouting from the dug-out. It was my first goal for me in INTER IIT level – from a five minute send off to an opening goal – it was all flashing in my mind. It took every ounce of will power to get back in game. The game went fairly with us having a majority of the possession. We however made a small defensive blunder which cost us badly and we ended up drawing the match which we easily should have won.
MATCH #2 vs IIT Kanpur
This was the game I was eagerly waiting for – It was revenge time. We would have met in the third place match in IIT Kharagpur if not for their disqualification. So this time I knew it was payback time for the defeats we had in their hands in the first two INTER IITs at Kanpur and Delhi. I also could never ever forget my send off against them in Delhi. Hence I so wanted to beat these guys very badly to find peace for my ego. This time the kick off was at 11:30 and it was damn cold. We didn’t get the chance to warm up properly and we started off on a bad note giving a penalty to them at the 10th minute. Déjà vu – it was happening all over again I thought. They had such low sportsmanship that they started wasting time so early in the match using throw ins and faking injuries (******).
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| Level of visibility during the match |
The following 60 minutes of the game were one of the most fire filled game I saw being played by IITH FC. I could see in each of my team mates eyes” how badly they want to win?”. Kanpur’s defense was a bit inexperienced and fortunately for us we had two of the fastest strikers of INTER IIT ( Navanshu a.k.a Junglee , Anil a.k.a Bolt ).We ripped apart their defense. We were dominating possession and making an attempt at goal every 5 minutes of the match. Eventually their defense had to break down as Anil scored a beautiful chip for a goal. The entire Kanpur team was stunned after the screaming we did after the goal. To be frank they were intimidated by us for the first time. The second half started with us pumped up full of fire. We had to use their weak fullbacks to our advantage and hence we mainly moved the ball from the wings and had to put the ball to the strikers. In the end this worked and we scored two more goals both being scored by Navanshu. Kanpur realized Karma is B*t*h.
MATCH #3 vs IIT Indore
MATCH #3 vs IIT Indore
The match against Indore was supposed to be a cake walk and it was. The only glitch was that the match was scheduled at 8:30 in the morning and it was freaking cold and one could not see beyond 20ft because of the mist. But not to worry as we totally outclassed Indore as we were in altogether new level. This match witnessed one of the marveling performances by a striker in IITH – Navanshu- the Hat Trick hero. All of INTER IIT was taking a look at IITH and he eventually became the most feared striker of INTER IIT 2012.
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| Navanshu |
So again we were the group toppers for the second year in a row. The expectations rose but as again challenges rose with it. The Quarter finals were against IIT Kharapur. They were the favorites for winning the tournament- They had a skill level that is one step higher than all the IITs. Till now our defense and goal keeper were never tested to the limits. So there were severe doubts whether we could handle the might of KGP. Seeing their practice sessions one day left us in awe for the team. But we could never stop to Believe – not after Roorkee!
Contd......... ( Scroll down for Part 2 )
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