There is no saturation point for Malabar's love for football. The more the game, the more the happiness. And, this summer is going to be special for the football-frenzied crowd as their favourite team Gokulam Kerala FC will be playing all their home matches of Kerala Football Premier League at EMS Corporation Stadium, Kozhikode. The league matches are organised by Kerala Football Association (KFA). According to KFA officials, 10 teams will participate in the event. “We have already started the game. The first two matches are over,” said KFA general secretary P Anil Kumar.
“We are expecting a huge crowd in Kozhikode. Gokulam Kerala FC has become a part of the football lovers in Malabar. They have accepted the team as their own. That was we saw in I-league matches. We expect more crowd to come to the stadium to cheer their favourite team this time,” he added.
EMS stadium is also the venue for the matches of Quartez FC. “The people of Malabar have always supported football. The game is in their blood. So, they will support Quartez FC too. Many players of the team are from Kozhikode. This will be an added advantage,” said Anil. The first match to be held in Kozhikode on Saturday is between Quartez FC and SBI. The first game of Gokulam FC will be held on Sunday. The team will take on Central Excise at EMS Corporation Stadium. All matches will be held in the evening from 4 pm. Matches to be held at EMS Corporation Stadium.
As Kerala lifts Santosh Trophy after 14 years, the roots can be traced to a football tournament unique to the state.
The floodlights on the six iron poles illuminate the makeshift football stadium on the banks of Poonur river at Koduvally in Kerala’s Kozhikode district. Laser beams cut through the din of the music and the wispy smokiness of the induced fog. Around 5,000 men are perched on a wooden gallery, two drones with cameras hover above. Pitch-side sprinklers spray water to settle the dust below, before recoiling their heads back underground. Around 7 pm, the players — of teams Mediguard, Areekode; and Lucky Soccer, Aluva — enter, to fireworks. The 36th edition of the All-India Koyappa Sevens Football Tournament kicks off. Starting March 27, the tournament will keep football lovers enthralled for a month. Just one of the 63 official and scores of unofficial ‘Sevens’ tournaments that will be held over six months at rural grounds in Kerala’s Thrissur, Malappuram, Palakkad, Kozhikode, Kannur and Kasaragod districts.
On April 1, when the Kerala football team won the Santosh Trophy in Kolkata after 14 years, the celebrations reverberated in these parts. Not only did most of the players hail from here, they also forged their careers in the same Sevens format. The region’s passion for the truncated version of the game is also at the heart of the recent critical and commercial Malayalam hit Sudani from Nigeria — about a football manager and his bond with his African import, who gets injured. Night after night, seven players per team (as opposed to the traditional 11), take on each other over a field 60 m long and 40 m wide (as against the standard 120×80 m), for an hour (as opposed to 90 minutes). Last season alone saw 978 such matches.The craze particularly engulfs the Muslim-majority Malappuram and neighbouring Kozhikode, where 8-10 deck galleries of bamboo and areca poles are propped up on dry river beds and paddy fields after the harvest in December-January. Promotional banners with photos of young African footballers crop up around villages. The fiesta lasts till the end of May, when the first monsoon showers leave the grounds slushy, muddy and unfit to play.
The sport was brought to the region nearly a century ago by British officers of the Malabar Special Police, which had a camp in Malappuram. The locals, particularly Muslims, soon took to it. But they had only paddy fields as grounds, giving birth to the Sevens version of the sport. For years, says R Vinayan, 70, patron of the ‘Sevens Football Association’, the shorter format did not receive recognition from state and national football associations, hindering the players. Then, in the 1950s, national players coming for the Sait Nagjee Football tournament in Kozhikode started seeking additional income in the local Sevens. “During the 1950s and 60s, local players were denied a chance as the football clubs of Kerala hired players from Bangalore and Goa. Such players moved en masse to the Sevens despite the threat of a ban,’’ says Vinayan, who owned the team ‘Black and White’ for nearly 50 years.
By the 1970s and ’80s, the matches had moved into enclosed grounds, with coconut palms serving as borders, and entry being made paid. In 1983, the Kerala Sevens Football Team Managers Association was formed to ensure that organisers paid teams the promised amounts. Former Indian footballer I M Vijayan says the Sevens football groomed players like him. “There would not be a single professional footballer in Kerala who hasn’t played in the Sevens,’’ he says. V K Afdal, 22, a striker in Kerala’s Santosh Trophy team, started out with the Sevens played in his village of Olipuzha in Malappuram. Showing the ground, just a stone’s throw from his house, he says, “A Sevens player is never shy of big crowds as he is used to playing before these galleries. Sevens is also faster,” says Afdal.
Jiyad Hassan, 25, another member of the Santosh Trophy team, has been a Sevens player for four seasons. “Sevens provides an opportunity for a lot of players who would otherwise have to sit idle. It has also brought the quality of the African players’ striking and dribbling skills to our grounds,” he says. V A Narayana Menon, a football coach and one of the promoters of the I-league side FC Gokulam, says the Sevens sustained the love for the game in the absence of football clubs and proper tournaments in Kerala.
Farook Pacheri, secretary of the Perinthalmanna-based Khadar Ali Sports Club, says the Sevens circuit is also known to plough back some of its profits for charity. Giving the example of his club, which has been conducting the Khadar Ali Sevens for 47 years and generated a profit of Rs 15 lakh last year, he says, “We gave the money to treat the poor and for marriage of destitute women, apart from for football coaching for school students.”
P K Abdul Vahab, coordinator of the Koyappa tournament conducted by Koduvally’s Lightning Club, believes the tournaments have been able to sustain themselves by becoming more professional with the times. “This year, we introduced drone cameras for live recording of matches. We have a huge electronic score board at the stadium now,” he says.
Kerala Football Association (KFA) president K M I Mather, however, is muted in his opinion about the Sevens. “Ten years ago, we had a discussion with FIFA on the status of the Sevens in Kerala. As per their suggestion, we consider it village football,” he says.
The 36 official teams that are playing the Sevens this year are registered with the Sevens Football Association (SFA). These include two from outside the state — FC Goa and United FC Mumbai — and as many as 14 from Malappuram. The tournaments are conducted by clubs, which themselves need not have a team. The participating teams are sent invitations based on their performance in the previous season.
Al-Minhal Musthafa, treasurer of the Valanchery Football Association, says the budget for a month-long tournament is around Rs 25 lakh. “A 10-deck gallery costs around Rs 6 lakh to build. The rest of the money is required to pay the teams, match officials and other expenses. We need Rs 75,000 a day. From tickets — each Rs 50 — we earn Rs 30,000-50,000, but the major source of funds are local brands and business houses,” says Musthafa.
“While fixing the schedule, we ensure there is no all-India match in the locality, so as to ensure revenue for the organisers,” says Asharaf Bava, the SFA secretary, who also owns Super Studio Malappuram FC.
The Sevens teams are mostly owned by former players or business houses. The clubs are mostly based out of one-room tenements, and like the league, come alive only during the season. “My father Ambayathingal Muhammed was one of the earliest football players at Areekode. Our family owned a medical shop named Mediguard. Hence, when I floated a Sevens team, we named it Mediguard,’’ smiles A M Habeebulla, 52, teacher at an upper primary school, who launched his team in 1997.
Asharaf Bhava, the owner of Super Studio, Malappuram, who also acted in Sudani from Nigeria, says the huge crowds make it easy to attract sponsors.
Rujeesh K, 36, who manages the Facebook pages and WhatsApp groups of the official Sevens tournament, says teams keep changing hands. “A good banner would fetch at least Rs 10 lakh. And with the SFA putting a ceiling on number of teams eligible for the Sevens, the best option is to buy an existing team,’’ says Rujeesh.
If at least Rs 6 lakh is needed a year to maintain a team, a chunk of the expenses are met by seasonal sponsorship. The teams get an average appearance fee of Rs 16,000 in the early rounds; for popular teams, this is higher. As a team progresses, so does the prize money. Winners eventually get between Rs 35,000 and Rs 40,000.
The biggest expense is the upkeep of players, a mix of foreign and local talent. A player is paid Rs 2,000-5,000 for a match, depending on past performance.
The controversy over Nigerian actor Samuel Abiola Robinson accusing producers of Sudani from Nigeria of racism is one-off. One of the highlights of the Sevens in recent years is the presence of Africans — known generically here as “Sudanis” (a throwback to when traders brought slaves from Sudan to the Malabar coast).
The SFA has increased the number of foreigners that can be fielded in a match to three this season. Most teams have four to five Africans on their roster.
Abdul Jabbar, the manager of Royal Travels FC, traces the trend back to the mid-’90s, when a number of African students were in colleges in the region. “Around that time, Sevens teams in Kerala handpicked some ‘Sudani’ students of Calicut University,’’ says Jabbar. Those students brought in friends from other parts of the country. The local clubs also began to scout the number of journeyman African players who began turning up in the country, particularly to try their luck with football clubs in West Bengal.
With no cap on the number of foreigners in a Sevens team, football team managers in Africa soon started doubling up as agents for the Kerala clubs.
This season, Jabbar says, at least 250 African players are camping in the region, many of them veterans of the Sevens. From Nigeria, Ivory Coast, Ghana, Liberia and Cameroon, they can make anywhere between Rs 1.5 lakh to Rs 3 lakh in a year.
The foreign players are given seasonal contracts and free accommodation and transportation to the tournament grounds. The teams also pay their visa and ticket charges. Sometimes, like in Kasaragod district, players have to travel 200 km for a game.
K Rashik, the owner of Lucky Soccer, Kotapuram, Malappuram, says foreigners are selected at the end of the season in May, with YouTube and WhatsApp changing the game. “We can now directly interact with interested foreigners, who send us footage of their performance.” At Kotapuram village near Kondotty in Malappuram district, striker Deco Eric Toe with Lucky Soccer club shares a house with four other Africans. The 27-year-old from Liberia says they are drawn to the league by the monetary benefits. “Most of us have families to support. This season alone I could send home about $2,500,” says Toe, who earlier tried his luck in the lower leagues of Cameroon.
Mohamed Abdullasi Doumbia, 32, a veteran of the Sevens circuit, lives at Anchachavadi village near Kalikavu. A native of Ivory Coast, he says, “Last year, I took home almost Rs 3 lakh. Two years ago, I started a used-car business in Ivory Coast with the money I earn here.” He has also come to love Kerala food, especially biryani and Kerala parotta.
A player for the Smak Media FC team, Doumbia, however, admits that most African players follow monotonous lives outside football. “We do not go out for any entertainment. We return to our quarters late at night or early in the morning and sleep till noon. On non-match days, we jog for an hour in the morning before sleeping again. At noon, we cook. If the team has provided us a TV, we watch sports channels. Otherwise, we just listen to music or watch movies on our phones,’’ he says.
In the past, the African players stayed back in Kerala after the Sevens season. But following some intervention by the Foreigner Registration Office, they now return home in the off-season.
Muhammed Nabeel, 22, who plays with Mediguard, says the presence of the African players has changed the game in another manner, by making it a more physical contest. “The Africans play hard. They also want the team to win at any cost and get emotional and angry if we make fouls or miss goals. But once outside the ground, they harbour no ill-feeling.”
At the same time, a majority of the local players picked for the Sevens remain daily wagers, who head to the game after a day’s work. Some even work in the Middle East in unskilled or semi-skilled jobs in the off season. In a small room in a wayside lodge at Pandikkad village in Malappuram, Muhammed Faris,19, is pulling on the jersey of KFC Kalikavu. A wall painter by day, Faris has just returned from a construction site. “This is my first all-India Sevens season,” he says. “For three years, I had been playing in the local Sevens at Kasaragod and Wayanad districts. I was paid Rs 700 a match then, I am now getting Rs 2,000.’’
Faris was also part of the MSP School team in Malappuram that featured in the Subroto Cup in 2015.
Faris says he can’t give up his day job as he is the sole breadwinner of his five-member family. “I earn Rs 700 a day from painting. If the match is at a faraway ground, I skip the work. I also need money to buy boots for the next under-19 I-league tournament,” he adds.
Muhammad Irfan, 22, also with KFC Kalikavu, says the fear of injury weighs on his mind. “I need the Sevens to feed my family. Last year I played with a team in Kasaragod for Rs 500. This season, KFC Kalikavu paid me Rs 1,500 per match… Even senior players have no financial security,’’ says Irfan, a native of Kalikavu who works as a light assistant for a videographer, to supplement his income. Having played in the Sevens for the last 14 years, Muhammad Ismail, 37, says, “My wife, three children and I survive on the Sevens.” He has been with FC Perinthalmanna for the last three seasons, and also runs a sports goods shop in Perinthalmanna with teammate V Hyderali.
Abdul Salam P, 25, who has been with FIFA Manjeri for the last eight years, believes the presence of foreigners too has affected the chances of local players like him. “This season, I haven’t played for 22 days after sustaining a leg injury,” says Salam, a goalkeeper, who works at the local fish market when there is no match.
But he would have it no other way. “Through my football, I have married off my sisters and am now looking after my mother, a widow,” says Salam.
‘The field was our namaz mat, going after the ball meditation’
It is extraordinary for a people to be so intensely sensitive and yet so non-violent. And the wonderful truth is that if you began to look for the most important reason behind this, the answer you would most likely end up with is Malappuram’s football mania.
Malappuram is not just about exceptionally talented people. This north-east district of Kerala has everything from barren lands to paddy fields, clay to rocks, hill stations to oceans and railway tracks, going up to the world’s tallest teak tree. Many have compared the place to Gabriel García Márquez’s fictional Macondo town (One Hundred Years of Solitude). In fact, if you had observed it from the ‘60s to the ’80s, you would have sworn there was no other place in India with so much love, peace and commitment. It is extraordinary for a people to be so intensely sensitive and yet so non-violent. And the wonderful truth is that if you began to look for the most important reason behind this, the answer you would most likely end up with is Malappuram’s football mania.
Now, you may wonder, what could be so special about this speck on the footballing map? The answer is simple — Sevens Football. Fourteen players jostling against each other, running between the sky and land. Everything is football here, including life itself. Grief, joy, anger, revenge, all emotions bundled together and kicked around in the mud. In the food you eat, you can taste the victory, or loss, of the previous game. At school, there are fights over it, bets placed. All for a game not known elsewhere — the Sevens.
The game evolved here from the 11 members a side out of constraints, of primarily land. Try to draw the boundaries of your normal football pitch here and you are likely to run into an arecanut tree every few steps. In earlier times, mothers would bring their children to doctors with broken limbs, or with shards of glass from playing barefeet.
But Malappuram’s children are taught that it is not victory or loss that is important, but the game. We would return from a game signing songs in the back of our jeep, regardless of the result. I called one of my music albums ‘KEF1126’, after the jeep’s numberplate. But it wasn’t just for the sake of memory. That numberplate was our sufi master, the football field was the mat on which we offered our namaz, the whistle was the azaan, going after the ball meditation.
All over Kerala, and especially Malappuram, Sudani from Nigeria is running successfully because, apart from showcasing the sport, it is also telling the story of the lives built around it. We ask a question in the song Enthundada kalpanthallathe ootam kollan vallathe (What do we have other than football to take pride in). A simple answer: The only organic sport that can’t be corrupted is football. For, a people in whose veins flows such a game cannot live any other way. It is only natural that they be loving and peaceful in nature. This is why when football World Cup beckons, you shouldn’t be heading to Russia, but Malappuram! Here you can see the unbeatable and inexplicable beauty of the flag of every footballing nation being adopted as the local flag.
It is not the presence of a grand church or any such thing that distinguishes the football craze of Malappuram over other places including Brazil; it is the wisdom that dribbling a ball is as sacred as circumambulating the Kaaba. Here’s a people who know to cheer an American football team while disagreeing with the politics of Trump’s USA. When Brazilian legend Pele describes football as “a beautiful game”, kids in Malappuram will correct him: It’s a beautiful life.
Off-field issues bedevilling Kerala Premier League
The Kerala Premier League, the football league run by the state football association KFA (Kerala Football Association) has been in shambles since its inception in 2013.
Last minute changes in fixtures, unpaid player salaries, lack of basic ground infrastructure are some of the issues that have hogged the limelight as the KPL just about holds on for survival in its fifth season.
The tournament that kicked off in 2013 with 12 participants has struggled to match the expectations of the football-loving state of Kerala. The first title was clinched by Eagles FC, a club that was later disbanded. SBI (State Bank Of India) Kerala team won back-to-back titles before KSEB (Kerala State Electricity Board) became champions last year. It is worth noting that all the winners so far are either disbanded or Government departmental clubs.
Last-ditch moves failing all parties concerned
A few days before the fifth season kicked off, defending champions KSEB and another departmental team, namely AG's Office, pulled out of the tournament citing financial and internal issues. And as a result, the ongoing KPL is a 10-team affair.
Interestingly, Indian Super League (ISL) side Kerala Blasters have chosen to field a reserve team in the KPL. In the tournament that kicked off on April 7, 2018, the only ISL team from Kerala has played just the league opener against FC Thrissur which they lost 1-2.
The team has since focused on their I-League second division commitments. FC Kerala's KPL fixtures were also changed due to the same league commitments. The fixture list was altered at least twice since the start of the season. The latest update of the fixture list has Kerala Blasters resuming their KPL duties on May 3rd against FC Thrissur.
Lack of professionalism a regular obstacle
The lack of professionalism from the participants has not helped the KFA sort out issues. The KPL even endured a walkover last season when players of Kozhikode-based Quartz FC refused to play an away match reportedly due to non-payment of wages. The club was forced to pull out and the FA had to change the fixtures yet again. Quartz were punished with a hefty fine and after winning a qualifier before the league, the team was allowed back into the KPL this season.
The competition format was changed last year so that the clubs play home and away games from their respective groups to seek progression into the final round. However, two-time champions SBI Kerala, a team from the capital city of Thiruvananthapuram, are sharing a 'home' ground in Kochi.
Infrastructure is the basic necessity for every league
Match-day experiences have been not been pleasing either. Without proper seats at several local stadia where the matches are held and little promotion of the event by the organizers, there has been little to no crowd support for most of the games. And the hundred or so people that turn out are unlikely to come back for another game. Everybody associated with the KPL looks disinterested and it looks like a league carried out just for the sake of having a 'top-tier' league in the state.
Here's Shamnas, Excise's Santosh Trophy winner and his teammate, on a pavement opposite the ground. Drenched. Without a "dressing room" to take cover, the players have scattered, some under trees. This for you is #KeralaPremierLeaguepic.twitter.com/B5NZxxjdir
Kerala's footballers have potential but they need a proper league to ply their trade in. Underwhelming attempts to run or take part in a 'professional' league like the KPL will not help change the sorry state of affairs of football in the state. Clubs can improve and so can the FA.
Pozhiyoor, a small fishing hamlet in Thiruvananthapuram, is making waves in the Indian football scene. In the past nine years the village has produced 24 Santosh Trophy footballers, giving it the nickname Santosh Trophy village. Freddy S, who represented Tamil Nadu in the Santosh Trophy in 2009, was the first from Pozhiyoor to play in the National Football Championship and ever since footballers from this tiny village that shares border with Tamil Nadu, have been queuing up to play Santosh Trophy. This year, when the state won the national championship after a gap of 14 years, Pozhiyoor was represented by two players - Lijo Siluvacrez, who was the vice-captain of the team and Seesan Selvan.
Besides these two, five other players played for different teams in this year’s Santosh Trophy. While Subhash and Rajesh S played for Karnataka, Ajeesh and Alvin were part of Tamil Nadu state team. Benno played for the Services team. Apart from these seven, two I-League players, Shinu S (Gokulam FC) and Britto PM (Churchill Brothers) also hail from this village.
Football became popular in this region in the early 60’s when two clubs, SMRC (under the guidance of Trivandrum Latin Archdiocese) and Udaya, came into existence. However, there was no proper playground, and playing on sand led to injuries. Frequent injuries meant that parents were wary of sending their kids to play football. “We used to hide our boots from our parents back then,” said Cleofas Alex, current Viva Chennai coach and former assistant coach of Tamil Nadu Santosh Trophy team.
In 2002, SMRC managed to build a ground in Pozhiyoor with the help of local people and Sports Council. “The ground came as a huge blessing. Though it was a mud ground, the youngsters began to show great improvement. And when players from here started to get jobs through football, people urged their kids to take up the game,” said Cleofas. Rajesh S, an employee with the Western Railway and the top scorer in this year’s Santosh Trophy with 23 goals, said his parents allowed him to play football because they wanted him to get a good job.
“Pozhiyoor is a small village but here we speak and breath football. This village sowed the seeds of the footballer in me,” said Lijo Siluvacrez.
Now Pozhiyoor has two grounds, each with a gallery and a clubhouse facility owned by SMRC and Udaya respectively. It won’t be long before one from this fishing village makes it to the Indian team.
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There is no saturation point for Malabar's love for football. The more the game, the more the happiness. And, this summer is going to be special for the football-frenzied crowd as their favourite team Gokulam Kerala FC will be playing all their home matches of Kerala Football Premier League at EMS Corporation Stadium, Kozhikode. The league matches are organised by Kerala Football Association (KFA). According to KFA officials, 10 teams will participate in the event. “We have already started the game. The first two matches are over,” said KFA general secretary P Anil Kumar.
“We are expecting a huge crowd in Kozhikode. Gokulam Kerala FC has become a part of the football lovers in Malabar. They have accepted the team as their own. That was we saw in I-league matches. We expect more crowd to come to the stadium to cheer their favourite team this time,” he added.
EMS stadium is also the venue for the matches of Quartez FC. “The people of Malabar have always supported football. The game is in their blood. So, they will support Quartez FC too. Many players of the team are from Kozhikode. This will be an added advantage,” said Anil. The first match to be held in Kozhikode on Saturday is between Quartez FC and SBI. The first game of Gokulam FC will be held on Sunday. The team will take on Central Excise at EMS Corporation Stadium. All matches will be held in the evening from 4 pm. Matches to be held at EMS Corporation Stadium.
As Kerala lifts Santosh Trophy after 14 years, the roots can be traced to a football tournament unique to the state.
The floodlights on the six iron poles illuminate the makeshift football stadium on the banks of Poonur river at Koduvally in Kerala’s Kozhikode district. Laser beams cut through the din of the music and the wispy smokiness of the induced fog. Around 5,000 men are perched on a wooden gallery, two drones with cameras hover above. Pitch-side sprinklers spray water to settle the dust below, before recoiling their heads back underground. Around 7 pm, the players — of teams Mediguard, Areekode; and Lucky Soccer, Aluva — enter, to fireworks. The 36th edition of the All-India Koyappa Sevens Football Tournament kicks off. Starting March 27, the tournament will keep football lovers enthralled for a month. Just one of the 63 official and scores of unofficial ‘Sevens’ tournaments that will be held over six months at rural grounds in Kerala’s Thrissur, Malappuram, Palakkad, Kozhikode, Kannur and Kasaragod districts.
On April 1, when the Kerala football team won the Santosh Trophy in Kolkata after 14 years, the celebrations reverberated in these parts. Not only did most of the players hail from here, they also forged their careers in the same Sevens format. The region’s passion for the truncated version of the game is also at the heart of the recent critical and commercial Malayalam hit Sudani from Nigeria — about a football manager and his bond with his African import, who gets injured. Night after night, seven players per team (as opposed to the traditional 11), take on each other over a field 60 m long and 40 m wide (as against the standard 120×80 m), for an hour (as opposed to 90 minutes). Last season alone saw 978 such matches.The craze particularly engulfs the Muslim-majority Malappuram and neighbouring Kozhikode, where 8-10 deck galleries of bamboo and areca poles are propped up on dry river beds and paddy fields after the harvest in December-January. Promotional banners with photos of young African footballers crop up around villages. The fiesta lasts till the end of May, when the first monsoon showers leave the grounds slushy, muddy and unfit to play.
The sport was brought to the region nearly a century ago by British officers of the Malabar Special Police, which had a camp in Malappuram. The locals, particularly Muslims, soon took to it. But they had only paddy fields as grounds, giving birth to the Sevens version of the sport. For years, says R Vinayan, 70, patron of the ‘Sevens Football Association’, the shorter format did not receive recognition from state and national football associations, hindering the players. Then, in the 1950s, national players coming for the Sait Nagjee Football tournament in Kozhikode started seeking additional income in the local Sevens. “During the 1950s and 60s, local players were denied a chance as the football clubs of Kerala hired players from Bangalore and Goa. Such players moved en masse to the Sevens despite the threat of a ban,’’ says Vinayan, who owned the team ‘Black and White’ for nearly 50 years.
By the 1970s and ’80s, the matches had moved into enclosed grounds, with coconut palms serving as borders, and entry being made paid. In 1983, the Kerala Sevens Football Team Managers Association was formed to ensure that organisers paid teams the promised amounts.
Former Indian footballer I M Vijayan says the Sevens football groomed players like him. “There would not be a single professional footballer in Kerala who hasn’t played in the Sevens,’’ he says. V K Afdal, 22, a striker in Kerala’s Santosh Trophy team, started out with the Sevens played in his village of Olipuzha in Malappuram. Showing the ground, just a stone’s throw from his house, he says, “A Sevens player is never shy of big crowds as he is used to playing before these galleries. Sevens is also faster,” says Afdal.
Jiyad Hassan, 25, another member of the Santosh Trophy team, has been a Sevens player for four seasons. “Sevens provides an opportunity for a lot of players who would otherwise have to sit idle. It has also brought the quality of the African players’ striking and dribbling skills to our grounds,” he says. V A Narayana Menon, a football coach and one of the promoters of the I-league side FC Gokulam, says the Sevens sustained the love for the game in the absence of football clubs and proper tournaments in Kerala.
Farook Pacheri, secretary of the Perinthalmanna-based Khadar Ali Sports Club, says the Sevens circuit is also known to plough back some of its profits for charity. Giving the example of his club, which has been conducting the Khadar Ali Sevens for 47 years and generated a profit of Rs 15 lakh last year, he says, “We gave the money to treat the poor and for marriage of destitute women, apart from for football coaching for school students.”
P K Abdul Vahab, coordinator of the Koyappa tournament conducted by Koduvally’s Lightning Club, believes the tournaments have been able to sustain themselves by becoming more professional with the times. “This year, we introduced drone cameras for live recording of matches. We have a huge electronic score board at the stadium now,” he says.
Kerala Football Association (KFA) president K M I Mather, however, is muted in his opinion about the Sevens. “Ten years ago, we had a discussion with FIFA on the status of the Sevens in Kerala. As per their suggestion, we consider it village football,” he says.
The 36 official teams that are playing the Sevens this year are registered with the Sevens Football Association (SFA). These include two from outside the state — FC Goa and United FC Mumbai — and as many as 14 from Malappuram. The tournaments are conducted by clubs, which themselves need not have a team. The participating teams are sent invitations based on their performance in the previous season.
Al-Minhal Musthafa, treasurer of the Valanchery Football Association, says the budget for a month-long tournament is around Rs 25 lakh. “A 10-deck gallery costs around Rs 6 lakh to build. The rest of the money is required to pay the teams, match officials and other expenses. We need Rs 75,000 a day. From tickets — each Rs 50 — we earn Rs 30,000-50,000, but the major source of funds are local brands and business houses,” says Musthafa.
“While fixing the schedule, we ensure there is no all-India match in the locality, so as to ensure revenue for the organisers,” says Asharaf Bava, the SFA secretary, who also owns Super Studio Malappuram FC.
The Sevens teams are mostly owned by former players or business houses. The clubs are mostly based out of one-room tenements, and like the league, come alive only during the season. “My father Ambayathingal Muhammed was one of the earliest football players at Areekode. Our family owned a medical shop named Mediguard. Hence, when I floated a Sevens team, we named it Mediguard,’’ smiles A M Habeebulla, 52, teacher at an upper primary school, who launched his team in 1997.
Asharaf Bhava, the owner of Super Studio, Malappuram, who also acted in Sudani from Nigeria, says the huge crowds make it easy to attract sponsors.
Rujeesh K, 36, who manages the Facebook pages and WhatsApp groups of the official Sevens tournament, says teams keep changing hands. “A good banner would fetch at least Rs 10 lakh. And with the SFA putting a ceiling on number of teams eligible for the Sevens, the best option is to buy an existing team,’’ says Rujeesh.
If at least Rs 6 lakh is needed a year to maintain a team, a chunk of the expenses are met by seasonal sponsorship. The teams get an average appearance fee of Rs 16,000 in the early rounds; for popular teams, this is higher. As a team progresses, so does the prize money. Winners eventually get between Rs 35,000 and Rs 40,000.
The biggest expense is the upkeep of players, a mix of foreign and local talent. A player is paid Rs 2,000-5,000 for a match, depending on past performance.
The controversy over Nigerian actor Samuel Abiola Robinson accusing producers of Sudani from Nigeria of racism is one-off. One of the highlights of the Sevens in recent years is the presence of Africans — known generically here as “Sudanis” (a throwback to when traders brought slaves from Sudan to the Malabar coast).
The SFA has increased the number of foreigners that can be fielded in a match to three this season. Most teams have four to five Africans on their roster.
Abdul Jabbar, the manager of Royal Travels FC, traces the trend back to the mid-’90s, when a number of African students were in colleges in the region. “Around that time, Sevens teams in Kerala handpicked some ‘Sudani’ students of Calicut University,’’ says Jabbar.
Those students brought in friends from other parts of the country. The local clubs also began to scout the number of journeyman African players who began turning up in the country, particularly to try their luck with football clubs in West Bengal.
With no cap on the number of foreigners in a Sevens team, football team managers in Africa soon started doubling up as agents for the Kerala clubs.
This season, Jabbar says, at least 250 African players are camping in the region, many of them veterans of the Sevens. From Nigeria, Ivory Coast, Ghana, Liberia and Cameroon, they can make anywhere between Rs 1.5 lakh to Rs 3 lakh in a year.
The foreign players are given seasonal contracts and free accommodation and transportation to the tournament grounds. The teams also pay their visa and ticket charges. Sometimes, like in Kasaragod district, players have to travel 200 km for a game.
K Rashik, the owner of Lucky Soccer, Kotapuram, Malappuram, says foreigners are selected at the end of the season in May, with YouTube and WhatsApp changing the game. “We can now directly interact with interested foreigners, who send us footage of their performance.” At Kotapuram village near Kondotty in Malappuram district, striker Deco Eric Toe with Lucky Soccer club shares a house with four other Africans. The 27-year-old from Liberia says they are drawn to the league by the monetary benefits. “Most of us have families to support. This season alone I could send home about $2,500,” says Toe, who earlier tried his luck in the lower leagues of Cameroon.
Mohamed Abdullasi Doumbia, 32, a veteran of the Sevens circuit, lives at Anchachavadi village near Kalikavu. A native of Ivory Coast, he says, “Last year, I took home almost Rs 3 lakh. Two years ago, I started a used-car business in Ivory Coast with the money I earn here.” He has also come to love Kerala food, especially biryani and Kerala parotta.
A player for the Smak Media FC team, Doumbia, however, admits that most African players follow monotonous lives outside football. “We do not go out for any entertainment. We return to our quarters late at night or early in the morning and sleep till noon. On non-match days, we jog for an hour in the morning before sleeping again. At noon, we cook. If the team has provided us a TV, we watch sports channels. Otherwise, we just listen to music or watch movies on our phones,’’ he says.
In the past, the African players stayed back in Kerala after the Sevens season. But following some intervention by the Foreigner Registration Office, they now return home in the off-season.
Muhammed Nabeel, 22, who plays with Mediguard, says the presence of the African players has changed the game in another manner, by making it a more physical contest. “The Africans play hard. They also want the team to win at any cost and get emotional and angry if we make fouls or miss goals. But once outside the ground, they harbour no ill-feeling.”
At the same time, a majority of the local players picked for the Sevens remain daily wagers, who head to the game after a day’s work. Some even work in the Middle East in unskilled or semi-skilled jobs in the off season. In a small room in a wayside lodge at Pandikkad village in Malappuram, Muhammed Faris,19, is pulling on the jersey of KFC Kalikavu. A wall painter by day, Faris has just returned from a construction site. “This is my first all-India Sevens season,” he says. “For three years, I had been playing in the local Sevens at Kasaragod and Wayanad districts. I was paid Rs 700 a match then, I am now getting Rs 2,000.’’
Faris was also part of the MSP School team in Malappuram that featured in the Subroto Cup in 2015.
Faris says he can’t give up his day job as he is the sole breadwinner of his five-member family. “I earn Rs 700 a day from painting. If the match is at a faraway ground, I skip the work. I also need money to buy boots for the next under-19 I-league tournament,” he adds.
Muhammad Irfan, 22, also with KFC Kalikavu, says the fear of injury weighs on his mind. “I need the Sevens to feed my family. Last year I played with a team in Kasaragod for Rs 500. This season, KFC Kalikavu paid me Rs 1,500 per match… Even senior players have no financial security,’’ says Irfan, a native of Kalikavu who works as a light assistant for a videographer, to supplement his income.
Having played in the Sevens for the last 14 years, Muhammad Ismail, 37, says, “My wife, three children and I survive on the Sevens.” He has been with FC Perinthalmanna for the last three seasons, and also runs a sports goods shop in Perinthalmanna with teammate V Hyderali.
Abdul Salam P, 25, who has been with FIFA Manjeri for the last eight years, believes the presence of foreigners too has affected the chances of local players like him. “This season, I haven’t played for 22 days after sustaining a leg injury,” says Salam, a goalkeeper, who works at the local fish market when there is no match.
But he would have it no other way. “Through my football, I have married off my sisters and am now looking after my mother, a widow,” says Salam.
‘The field was our namaz mat, going after the ball meditation’
It is extraordinary for a people to be so intensely sensitive and yet so non-violent. And the wonderful truth is that if you began to look for the most important reason behind this, the answer you would most likely end up with is Malappuram’s football mania.
Malappuram is not just about exceptionally talented people. This north-east district of Kerala has everything from barren lands to paddy fields, clay to rocks, hill stations to oceans and railway tracks, going up to the world’s tallest teak tree. Many have compared the place to Gabriel García Márquez’s fictional Macondo town (One Hundred Years of Solitude). In fact, if you had observed it from the ‘60s to the ’80s, you would have sworn there was no other place in India with so much love, peace and commitment. It is extraordinary for a people to be so intensely sensitive and yet so non-violent. And the wonderful truth is that if you began to look for the most important reason behind this, the answer you would most likely end up with is Malappuram’s football mania.
Now, you may wonder, what could be so special about this speck on the footballing map? The answer is simple — Sevens Football. Fourteen players jostling against each other, running between the sky and land. Everything is football here, including life itself. Grief, joy, anger, revenge, all emotions bundled together and kicked around in the mud. In the food you eat, you can taste the victory, or loss, of the previous game. At school, there are fights over it, bets placed. All for a game not known elsewhere — the Sevens.
The game evolved here from the 11 members a side out of constraints, of primarily land. Try to draw the boundaries of your normal football pitch here and you are likely to run into an arecanut tree every few steps. In earlier times, mothers would bring their children to doctors with broken limbs, or with shards of glass from playing barefeet.
But Malappuram’s children are taught that it is not victory or loss that is important, but the game. We would return from a game signing songs in the back of our jeep, regardless of the result. I called one of my music albums ‘KEF1126’, after the jeep’s numberplate. But it wasn’t just for the sake of memory. That numberplate was our sufi master, the football field was the mat on which we offered our namaz, the whistle was the azaan, going after the ball meditation.
All over Kerala, and especially Malappuram, Sudani from Nigeria is running successfully because, apart from showcasing the sport, it is also telling the story of the lives built around it. We ask a question in the song Enthundada kalpanthallathe ootam kollan vallathe (What do we have other than football to take pride in). A simple answer: The only organic sport that can’t be corrupted is football.
For, a people in whose veins flows such a game cannot live any other way. It is only natural that they be loving and peaceful in nature. This is why when football World Cup beckons, you shouldn’t be heading to Russia, but Malappuram! Here you can see the unbeatable and inexplicable beauty of the flag of every footballing nation being adopted as the local flag.
It is not the presence of a grand church or any such thing that distinguishes the football craze of Malappuram over other places including Brazil; it is the wisdom that dribbling a ball is as sacred as circumambulating the Kaaba. Here’s a people who know to cheer an American football team while disagreeing with the politics of Trump’s USA. When Brazilian legend Pele describes football as “a beautiful game”, kids in Malappuram will correct him: It’s a beautiful life.
http://indianexpress.com/article/sports/football/kerala-football-team-malappurams-football-mania-sudani-from-nigeria-5137759/
Off-field issues bedevilling Kerala Premier League
The Kerala Premier League, the football league run by the state football association KFA (Kerala Football Association) has been in shambles since its inception in 2013.
Last minute changes in fixtures, unpaid player salaries, lack of basic ground infrastructure are some of the issues that have hogged the limelight as the KPL just about holds on for survival in its fifth season.
The tournament that kicked off in 2013 with 12 participants has struggled to match the expectations of the football-loving state of Kerala. The first title was clinched by Eagles FC, a club that was later disbanded. SBI (State Bank Of India) Kerala team won back-to-back titles before KSEB (Kerala State Electricity Board) became champions last year. It is worth noting that all the winners so far are either disbanded or Government departmental clubs.
Last-ditch moves failing all parties concerned
A few days before the fifth season kicked off, defending champions KSEB and another departmental team, namely AG's Office, pulled out of the tournament citing financial and internal issues. And as a result, the ongoing KPL is a 10-team affair.
Interestingly, Indian Super League (ISL) side Kerala Blasters have chosen to field a reserve team in the KPL. In the tournament that kicked off on April 7, 2018, the only ISL team from Kerala has played just the league opener against FC Thrissur which they lost 1-2.
The team has since focused on their I-League second division commitments. FC Kerala's KPL fixtures were also changed due to the same league commitments. The fixture list was altered at least twice since the start of the season. The latest update of the fixture list has Kerala Blasters resuming their KPL duties on May 3rd against FC Thrissur.
Lack of professionalism a regular obstacle
The lack of professionalism from the participants has not helped the KFA sort out issues. The KPL even endured a walkover last season when players of Kozhikode-based Quartz FC refused to play an away match reportedly due to non-payment of wages. The club was forced to pull out and the FA had to change the fixtures yet again. Quartz were punished with a hefty fine and after winning a qualifier before the league, the team was allowed back into the KPL this season.
The competition format was changed last year so that the clubs play home and away games from their respective groups to seek progression into the final round. However, two-time champions SBI Kerala, a team from the capital city of Thiruvananthapuram, are sharing a 'home' ground in Kochi.
Infrastructure is the basic necessity for every league
Match-day experiences have been not been pleasing either. Without proper seats at several local stadia where the matches are held and little promotion of the event by the organizers, there has been little to no crowd support for most of the games. And the hundred or so people that turn out are unlikely to come back for another game. Everybody associated with the KPL looks disinterested and it looks like a league carried out just for the sake of having a 'top-tier' league in the state.
Kerala's footballers have potential but they need a proper league to ply their trade in. Underwhelming attempts to run or take part in a 'professional' league like the KPL will not help change the sorry state of affairs of football in the state. Clubs can improve and so can the FA.
Pozhiyoor, Kerala’s Santosh Trophy village
Pozhiyoor, a small fishing hamlet in Thiruvananthapuram, is making waves in the Indian football scene. In the past nine years the village has produced 24 Santosh Trophy footballers, giving it the nickname Santosh Trophy village.Freddy S, who represented Tamil Nadu in the Santosh Trophy in 2009, was the first from Pozhiyoor to play in the National Football Championship and ever since footballers from this tiny village that shares border with Tamil Nadu, have been queuing up to play Santosh Trophy. This year, when the state won the national championship after a gap of 14 years, Pozhiyoor was represented by two players - Lijo Siluvacrez, who was the vice-captain of the team and Seesan Selvan.
Besides these two, five other players played for different teams in this year’s Santosh Trophy. While Subhash and Rajesh S played for Karnataka, Ajeesh and Alvin were part of Tamil Nadu state team. Benno played for the Services team. Apart from these seven, two I-League players, Shinu S (Gokulam FC) and Britto PM (Churchill Brothers) also hail from this village.
Football became popular in this region in the early 60’s when two clubs, SMRC (under the guidance of Trivandrum Latin Archdiocese) and Udaya, came into existence. However, there was no proper playground, and playing on sand led to injuries. Frequent injuries meant that parents were wary of sending their kids to play football. “We used to hide our boots from our parents back then,” said Cleofas Alex, current Viva Chennai coach and former assistant coach of Tamil Nadu Santosh Trophy team.
In 2002, SMRC managed to build a ground in Pozhiyoor with the help of local people and Sports Council. “The ground came as a huge blessing. Though it was a mud ground, the youngsters began to show great improvement. And when players from here started to get jobs through football, people urged their kids to take up the game,” said Cleofas. Rajesh S, an employee with the Western Railway and the top scorer in this year’s Santosh Trophy with 23 goals, said his parents allowed him to play football because they wanted him to get a good job.
“Pozhiyoor is a small village but here we speak and breath football. This village sowed the seeds of the footballer in me,” said Lijo Siluvacrez.
Now Pozhiyoor has two grounds, each with a gallery and a clubhouse facility owned by SMRC and Udaya respectively. It won’t be long before one from this fishing village makes it to the Indian team.