An Experiment With Football # 13

An Experiment With Football # 12

Do you see the goal post? I didn't ask them to put it up there. They did it on their own !!

We got a match day after tomorrow, on Sunday. Raghunath Pura fiercely practicing to win their debut match at IIM U ground !!

Never had I thought, the girls would play the game in rain. They are excited. They have something to prove on Sunday noon. I don't know, but tell you this has been the most exciting month. Every evening has been full of smiles, watching them kick the ball between the post !! Do join us at IIM U ground - Sunday, 14th July @ 4pm !!

An Experiment With Football # 11

Watch them play !!

An Experiment With Football # 10

Talking of schools, biddi, shoes, mangoes, thorns

Directing the play !!

From the left - Kalpana, Meena, Rajkumari, Usha, Nirmala (cannot see her face), Nirmala (another, but taller one), Basanti, Hema, Phulwanti and Abhisek Kumar. 

An Experiment With Football # 9

Understanding player positions -- Who is a forward? What does a mid-field do? What are right and left wings? When does the defense come into play? With a twig and few pebbles, Abhisek explains what formation they should play for the day. 

The girls at Raghunath Pura came in the initial days and left back to home. We took help of a localite, Vijay Tarawadi to understand why was it so? We realized that they didn't want to play in front/with the boys. Interesting insight for us. Here we make another attempt to motivate them to play every evening through showing few videos, documentaries. It certainly had an impact, but would it last? We are clueless, but really hope it does and they come out in numbers. They want to play separately from the boys, thats for sure. 

Meanwhile, Harish Kotagiri (coaches the girls)  is having a great time at Kali Magri. Pradeep Meena (missing from the photo) has taken the responsibility to train the boys. 

Dribble through !!

Get the ball from me !!

We are making real progress at both the villages. There has been a considerable improvement, in the way the kids have been playing the game. We really see big things coming up from the set of individuals playing and associated with the cause even. Keep reading and following !! We at Kranti need your support and involvement. 

An Experiment With Football # 8

We tried raising some funds to sponsor the match planned on 14th July, 2013. We are really thankful to the entire IIM U community as we collected Rs.1180 and brought ourselves 3 brand new Nivea footballs. The boys at the villages went bonkers looking at the new footballs. We felt the spark again. 

They are the thorn-plants -- Babool. If pricked by them, the pain is immense. Imaginne Lokesh, Kailash playing bare-footed every evening and at times limping because of it. Here they are, volunteering to clean the mess up and have a nice ground for us to play. We already have punctured 2 footballs in past 10 days and cannot afford to lose more. 

Lots of work to do in the sun !!

They call it as 'white-white' and they form our boundaries. They are slowly working together, realizing they are a team, now they offer water to the other first and drink later, get on the ground in time waiting for us to arrive and are even ready to jog around the ground. Earlier it seemed them to be as a punishment, now they realize its essential. 

Form a straight-line and pour on the 'white-white'

Abhisek, the new addition to the team jogs around the team. It is great to watch them play. Would soon post a video of them playing. The revolution begins at our own backyard. Kranti Ayegi, Hum Layenge. Cheers. 

An Experiment With Football # 7

Are you surprised to see a basket-ball court ? We were also surprised to find such a beautiful court in the outskirts of Udaipur town. Well its part of 'Khelgaon', a government project to encourage sports in Rajasthan and still is under construction.
It has got no football grounds. The nearby villagers play cricket inside the basketball court and at times the security guard does come running behind them, but who listens. We took permission from the sarpanch and began our 1st day at the new village 'Kaali Magri'. Kranti Football had its first volunteer ---- Harish Kotagiri (https://www.facebook.com/kotagiri.harish) on court today. Harish Kotagiri is going to train 'Kaali Magri' kids to play football. 

Amazing girls I must say. They had played football earlier. Raghunath Pura is just 2km far away from Kaali Magri, but the difference in the infrastructure available, the exposure these kids earlier had is quite visible to us on the very first day. Few even challenged me to snatch the ball away from them and were successful. I am mighty impressed, a lot of confidence, I must say. 

On the left hand-side, Harish Kotagiri watches the guys play. Harish had played football earlier at college and university level. He is left-footed has been trained by professionals, hence Kranti Football brought him in to help the kids understand the football nuances. He is now responsible for the teams that come up from Kaali Magri. The idea is similar that to create a lot of masti, fun and thrill while playing. It doesn't begin with lot of running, sprints, exercises and tiring stuff. 

Harish mentions he sees a lot of potential in them. On the first day, all of us kicked the ball around. It is complete chaos, when a crowd of 25-30 people kick around the ball. If you observe, they are playing with a new Nivea ball. We slowly find the need to get few more footballs and basic things essential to play the game, probably a whistle, marker etc.
It's always great, when you begin, we need to make it sustainable and keep the energy-level always at a high. 

Most of the girls study in the nearby government school. They are not well versed with English, but unlike girls from Raghunath Pura, they are not forced into household work. I see such a stark difference in their lives and as I said a mere 2km of distance separates these 2 villages. It's also surprising to learn that many of them dn't know where the nearest village is. Hence we see football providing them with a platform where they get exposed to the outer-world, play the beautiful game and gain confidence, achieve and be proud of themselves. 

I love this snap !!

Now back to Raghunath Pura. The space where we played once is now ploughed. The tractor has done it's work. We search for a new space to play and finally found one with the help of sarpanch's son. They tell me that the ground now we use is unoccupied and won't be ploughed. I am not sure, if we loose this space where shall we go to play? But today we play and we play good on this plain ground. Yes the new ground is plain. It has thorns, but its manageable. Imagine at Raghunath Pura --- a unoccupied field full of thorns and at Kaali Magri ------ a beautiful basketball court. It's so unfair, wish I could take these kids out there. We need to talk to their parents. 

Basanti (L) and Hema (R) have become regulars. They come down at time and help me in organizing other little girls. Settling into a routine, here the captains take their turns in attacking, defending and organizing their team. To be very honest, they do not have that control over the ball. But come on, it's been just a week, what do we expect them to do? I love the smile, when a pass goes right, when I give them a pat on their back. But I even take them out of the game, if they are giggling, throwing stones at each other. 

Few of the them have started picking up the game real fast !!

To keep it interesting, we have this dribbling game. They find it real amusing to spell out the word 'dribbling'. It's a long way to go from here. But we shall keep trying and train these kids to play better football everyday and enjoy their beautiful evenings !! Adios !!

An Experiment With Football # 6

A monster runs over the field we play. The grey clouds make their way to Raghunath Pura. The farmers decide its time that their fields are ready to be ploughed, the jowar & corn are being sowed. From tomorrow onwards, we need to find a a new space to play. Pretty difficult, when the guys do not want to travel and there is no plain space nearby. 

While Gaurav, guards the post, they are learning how to kick the ball in air and shoot it with power. None could shoot it with real power. They cannot afford to get shoes now, most of them don't have more then 2 pair of clothes. I cannot ask them to buy shorts. One of them told me, if he could cut the bottom of his jean.

Most of the girls have stopped coming to play. The reason said to me is that they have lot of household work. Lalita hasn't come to play since 3 days. Basanti, Hema are regular, but I see that they are losing interest as they got no friends at play. Tomorrow we plan to visit their parents, talk to other villagers and ask them for their daughters to be at the ground every evening for the practice. 

The tractor is right behind us. After 15 minutes of play from here, it devours the space on which we stand. We are practicing the 'formation' where a side attacks and other keeps defending. The idea is to help them understand why possession and passes are important. Few have started to get it. They now know when to run, when to dribble etc. Though not anything is near to be average even, but they are enjoying the game !! 

Attack vs Defense 

We practice dribbling at a place, which is a walkway for villagers.Two rows are made up and guys are asked to dribble between the gap and the one who finishes first are the winners. It's a good thing as they are keen to keep the ball under their feet and control. Hopefully they can dribble better in this way.

Later on, we went to a new village today. It's a little far from IIM U hostel, but it was worth the effort as we met the sarpanch of Kaali Magri. It must be having some 50 households. We are going to interact with them tomorrow at evening. I plan to stay at Raghunath Pura and Gaurav would head to Kaali Magri. We plan to have a match soon  just for fun and create that excitement --------- Raghunath Pura vs Kaali Magri !!!

An Experiment With Football # 5

We are around 15-20 playing on a small unleveled ground. It was time to take the spade and even out the mound. 2 spades were brought in and the boys went into action. It had rained heavily, the soil was moist and we are slowly increasing our area of play. 

Eventually the norms are being followed, rules are being followed, a sort of discipline is getting into the space. People here are ready before time. 

Over the week, I have learned little things. It's not easy to teach, convince, show the bigger picture to the kids. A lot of patience is required, the dream is not easy to achieve, it require support from all aspects. I need to have a team, the kid's parents need to be more supporting. Today the girls did not turn up, because they got stuck with house-hold work. We have to talk to parents, government school teachers and have a strong local support. Hope we get a little more plain space tomorrow to play. Cheers. 

An Experiment With Football # 4

It was quite sunny this afternoon. I reached at 4pm and to my surprise, bingo, everyone is on time. The girls show their commitment and are in numbers today. What a pretty sight it was. I think yesterday's talk worked, the energy to play was great. We plan to select a team each of girls and boys. Deepak (centre)  has been an interesting find, he understands the game and I have assigned him the responsibility to help girls play.  

Here is Kailash, his legs are pretty good. Deepak and Kailash make up a good duo. Hence I thought it would be great, if I had assign them responsibility to organize the girls team initially. They are teaching the basics to the girls, I observe from the boundary. I have started getting their names, from left --- Nirmala, Basanti, Kailash, Hema, Kalpana. It's a start for them, they just kick the ball with their toe, crowd around the ball. It's like Lagaan, but they would slowly improve. Feels great to see them on the ground. 

The little guy in yellow is Suresh, he is a rat. He is energetic, hops around the field and even punctured the ball. So the punishment is that they have to regularly attend practice till 25th and if they make good progress in the game, they would be gifted with a Cosco. Same goes with the girls. They need to earn the football and we carried on playing with the punctured football. These fellows are working on the ground, they used the spade to widen it a bit. The field is slowly getting a rectangular shape. 

We taught them formation today. One-side had to attack, trapping and passing the ball, the other had to stop them from coming forward. The boys have picked it up fast, the 'rowdy' game that they had been playing has been put to a stop, they too realize that possession of the ball is important, passing it, moving forward etc. Here we see Kailash and Deepak leading their teams. Before they began, I told the boys that they need to understand that girls too can play the game, they should not mock them,laugh at them. They are from one village, they shall play together as a team and the above  picture inspires me. 

These girls work. They wash the utensils, need to get vegetables and cook dinner, tie the cows at the shed etc. The only demand that they put forward me was asking me to come early and leave them early, so that they could go back to their duties. Phew !! How could I refuse, we fix a time and from tomorrow onwards, the girls train with us at 4pm. 

The day was awesome for us. The body language was positive, there is interest being generated and lot of enthusiasm about the idea of contesting with nearby villages and winning a tournament. We plan to organize a local tournament at IIM U ground in first week of August and am working towards it. Hopefully, Raghunath Pura girls leave their mark at the tournament. Let us bring the change in their lives !! Hum Layenge Kranti !!

An Experiment With Football # 3

We met again. Luckily, unexpectedly all of them were present. Again talking about the basics, they carefully listen. I have to improve my communication skill, quite bad at it, am little impatient and want them to get things quickly. They understand Mewari better, their native language. Most of them work in the city as the school-holidays are on, once their schools start, I believe I would have lot of guys on the field.    

Remember the girl who had fled yesterday, returned back with her boots today. Lalita, came back and even played along with few girls. You know if you watch others play at some point of time you had feel like being part of it. Lalita promises me to be back tomorrow with other girls. 

The nearest plain ground must be around 5km. This is really uneven. I am in a fix, if I change the location, peope won't come up and if I stay down here, it's a futile attempt as the ball doesn't even roll properly. Most of them have slippers on and with beer glasses all over the place, its quite dangerous. But still we carry on. They did fulfill their promise of cleaning the field within their capacity.  

Finally as expected, the ball gets punctured. With not much of experience myself, I am quite lost about how to manage the guys? Am I able to communicate my idea properly to them? Are we on the right track ? Have their minds get tuned towards forming a team and playing together? Can I improve on a set of kids who till recently had never seen a ball? 

But I plan to hang on at Raghunath Pura. A new day and we shall play again.