the goan I network
PANAJI
Goa Football Development Council (GFDC), the premier grassroots football development organisation in the State, will organise a one-day programme across all its 37 centres across Goa to celebrate the Asian Football Confederation (AFC) Grassroots Day on May 15.
“The youth across the State are being trained and nurtured under the watchful eyes of trained coaches at GFDC. This will help to lead in the revival of good footballing times for the state in the years to come. Grassroots football is the backbone of football development in the world over and is reflected among countries such as Germany, Spain and Belgium,” GFDC said in a statement.
The Chairman of GFDC, Dr Rufino Monteiro informed that around 4,000 odd GFDC trainees are expected to be part of this festival. He also praised the performance put up by his trainees at the grassroots level.
“Many of our grassroots players have found a place in the other teams of the U-15 League which shows the effectiveness of our grassroots development program. Our first batch of trainees that represented Churchill Brothers SC have been crowned as the AIFF U-15 I-League Zonal Champions. They are also the winners of the GFA U-16 South Goa league and eventually the state Runners-up. They have also represented Goa at the Subroto Cup at Delhi for the last two consecutive years after being crowned state champions,” Dr Rufino said in the press release.
“The lone Goan at the prestigious ISL Academy in Mumbai is a GFDC trainee, Narendra Naik from the Aldona grassroots centre. The grassroots program at GFDC has attracted interest from few top clubs in the country who are in talks to pick up few of our promising trainees. We at GFDC believe that grassroots football development is the key to bringing up our level in the sport,” he added.
