Britain's Bengali diaspora has taken a new initiative of promoting football among the expats in the UK. Inspired by the nostalgic rivalry between two football giants in Kolkata, Mohun Bagan and East Bengal, the Bengali diaspora in the UK will organise a fan football tournament at London’s Slough Town Football Club on July 22, with a seating capacity of more than 2000 audience.
Christened as IFA Shield UK, on the lines of IFA Shield Kolkata, the concept not only taps the Bengali's love for football but also rekindles the eternal 'Bangal-Ghoti' fight that the GenY (especially in the UK) is almost unaware of. The event will also include a food festival. Only, IFA here stands for the Indian Fans Association of the UK.
Three East Bengal and three Mohun Bagan fan teams will play round robin to decide the finalists. But there is a twist to the tournament — matches will be played only between East Bengal and Mohun Bagan fan teams. An East Bengal fan team will never play another East Bengal team. The same goes for Mohun Bagan fan teams. The 20-minute games, split in two halves, will have a five-minute break.
The teams have been named after football legends. The three Mohun Bagan sides have been named after Sailen Manna, Shivdas Bhaduri and Sudip Chatterjee and East Bengal teams after Christian Junior, Ahmed Khan and Krishanu Dey.
The gala event seems to have caught the diaspora’s imagination. Weekly practice sessions have started at Slough, Hounslow and Harrow. The opportunity (of playing football wearing jerseys of their favourite clubs) has evoked much excitement. Among those playing against is 16-year-old Booklyn Don Mapfumo, who plays for Chelsea U17 as the main striker, and is now in the Mohun Bagan team. Each team will have a player from the EU.
The event has created a huge sensation across the Europe where Bengalis from mainland Europe countries are also going to join. While promoting healthy living among diaspora is an aspect, another bigger objective of this tournament is to bring Gen Y of Bengali immigrants to mainstream football of UK. Organisers would like to enhance UK to Bengal football relationship in order to improve Bengal’s/India’s football quality through workshops, training etc and help to realise the dream of India playing in football world cup in coming years.
Two Bengali cultural organisations in UK London Sharad Utsav (LSU) and Adda Slough are organising the event as part of its Bengal Heritage project, that took off last year to promote Bengal’s cultural heritage in England.
The main partner helping to promote this tournament is NHS. This tournament has been recognised by Football Association (FA) which is an equivalent of AIFF of India as community football event. FA is also interested to promote football among Indian immigrants of Bengali descent and develop professional footballers in the future.
IFA Shield UK has also got its theme song written by LSU member Nirmal Nag, composed by Bollywood composer Sunjoy Bose. Famous Bollywood singer and Indian Union Govt minister Babul Supriyo, who is no longer attending the event, has lent his voice for this song. Kolkata football superstar of yesteryears Cheema Okorie will also join this tournament, and lead one of the East Bengal teams.
