The Hindu : Match called off, to be played afresh

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Sunday, Nov 03, 2002

Sport

Sport - Football

Match called off, to be played afresh

By Amitabha Das Sharma

IMPHAL NOV. 2. A controversial decision that put Goa ahead in the 55th minute against host Manipur, led to a major crowd trouble that caused the abandonment of the second semifinal of the 58th National football championship for the LG Santosh Trophy here at the Main Stadium in Khuman Lampak Sports Complex on Saturday.

There will be a rematch of the second semifinal on Sunday as the All India Football Federation disciplinary committee chairman, Mr. Hardev Jadeja, who represented the national body, headed a tournament committee decision to have the match afresh.

Mr. Jadeja, briefing the media after a marathon meeting with the local organisers and the match commissioner spoke about the decision of the replay late in the evening.

Mr. Jadeja was empowered to take the decision in consonance with the relevant authorities here after the AIFF president, Mr. Priya Ranjan Das Munshi, and secretary, Mr. Alberto Colaco, were briefed about the incident over telephone.

Generally, the laws tend to award the visitor the match in case of an abandonment owing to home crowd trouble.

But Mr. Jadeja argued that `the situation merited a replay' in order to ensure a proper ending to the contest.

He said both the teams were taken into confidence to arrive at the decision.

Karnataka referee S.M. Balu seemed to overlook an apparent off-side when Goa substitute Climax Lawrence shot home to have the visitor gaining a crucial lead early in the second session of the match.

This sparked off a reaction from the Eastern stand and quickly spread all over the stadium, as the partisan home supporters did not agree to the referee's decision.

The match had to be stopped almost immediately after the goal was scored, as missiles rained into the playing arena forcing the referee to stop the match.

There was no let-down in the trouble which dilated every passing minute.

Two attempts to restart the match yielded little result as the crowd, a full house of around 30,000, grew wilder bringing down the giant makeshift scoreboard and the advertisement hoardings adorning the picturesque stadium.

Bottles, both plastic and glass, chunks of cement broken off from the concrete galleries and pieces of glass flew in from all corners, aimed at the assistant referee, Biswajit Bera of Bengal, who signaled the goal and the referee who upheld his colleague's decision.

The Goa players and the visiting team bench were also made the target as the venue was engulfed in a total mayhem.

The supporters also dismantled the scoreboard and made a bonfire out of that as the local police stood perplexed unable to control the wild show of displeasure on the stands.

Mr. Hardev Jadeja, who was present made a `personal visit,' as he came down to the ground and took charge in the centre. While, apparently trying to calm things down, he asked the Manipur players and their coach, Shanti Singh, to appeal to the spectators to calm down and allow the match to restart.

The Inspector General of local police, Mr. A. Romen Kumar Singh, also failed in his bid to control the crowd.

Despite personally supervising the police's attempts at pacifying the crowd, Mr. Singh's efforts were nixed as the crowd hardly looked in a mood to listen.

While the demand for the revoking of the referee's decision grew and the trouble appeared to grow out of proportion, the decision of abandoning the match was finally declared over the public-address system 43 minutes after the trouble started.

The referee and the officials showed lot of patience, generally only a 15-minute wait in such situations is necessary to call off a match, hoping for sense to prevail on the stands.

The match, prior to the trouble, had little to offer as both the teams played a listless game shorn of imagination and initiative. The first session hardly saw any chance coming up as both the teams struggled to set their attacks right.

Goa appeared to enjoy some advantage in the exchanges but that was not enough to fetch a goal in the first session, which ended goalless. The introduction of Climax Lawrence in the second session in place of an off-colour striker Nitin Pradhan appeared to spruce the Goa attack.

The forward did justify his inclusion scoring off a Covan Lawrence provision but looked a bit off-sided in his attempt, which eventually sparked off the trouble.

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