When we talk about ‘Cricket’ in India it is not only refereed as a Game that is enjoyed and worshiped by majority of the Indian population. Rewind many years back (1980’s), West Indies was the team that had awesome bowlers that were experts in bowling bouncers!! That was the time when ‘Test Cricket’ was played a lot and also enjoyed by many. In 1990’s, One day cricket (50 over format) gained momentum and slowly took over the numero uno position. Batsmen became more aggressive since they had only 50 overs in hand unlike test cricket where there were 5 days to prove their worth 🙂
As they say, only thing that is constant in life is “Change”. Fast forward now, T20 cricket (20 over format) is most watched format since T20 means “Hard Hitting”, more 6’s, more boundaries & eye-catching fielding. In our apartments, we also play another format of Cricket termed as “Box Cricket” where there are lesser players, confined space and more focus on techniques (cover drive being the favourite shot).
One more game that has gained popularity is Football. In fact, Football is now looked upon as a serious career by many and some credit for this should be to the “Schools” who are taking right steps in nurturing talent. As mentioned earlier, you require more elegance when you have to play consecutive cover-drive’s (when space is confined). Same holds good for football where you have another variation of football called ‘Futsal’. Futsal is played in Uruguay and Brazil but is now seeing wide-spread adoption in India. As you would have guessed it is played indoors and is a five a side game. It is a modified version of football that would test and hone your skills 🙂 Futsal Federation of India has played important role in popularizing that game in India.
In fact, such is the growing craze of Futsal in India that even FIFA players (former or current) want to grab a share of this pie 🙂 Luis Figo (Former Fifa World Player of the Year) has expressed interest to start his own academy in India. As per this article, he would be on a 3 day visit to India (covering Mumbai and Chennai). There is a growing craze of the game in India and the legend wants to “take the craze to the next level”.
Considering that there are many malls that have facilities for Indoor Football and introduction of Inter-School Under-12 Futsal Cup are proving that it is an opportunity that needs to be pursued. If you are football fanatic, than you should definitely watch out for Luis Figo in India and he is as excited to be in India (as we are :)). Given there is huge space crunch (with amount of open-space for playing reducing in India), there are many youngsters who have started ‘Rooftop Futsal’ in Chennai.
As we write this article, the World Cup T20 finals (West Indies vs England) is underway and there is still lot of excitement in India, even though we are out of the tournament. With Shortened format being the flavor of the season, we are sure that Futsal is here to stay in India and reach newer heights. With India being on radar of former FIFA players (like Luis Figo), time would surely come when you would have Futsal Tournaments that would grab more eye-balls than T20 !!!
You just need Grass Field (or artificial Turf), Confined Area and Football Kit to play Futsal and we are sure that you can find plenty of Confined Areas around you to get started with Futsal.
Let’s Futsal !!!
[Image Credit* – Futsal]