Football in Northeast

No dearth of talent in NE: Aloke, Atanu

Guwahati, Dec 8: Two former India internationals Aloke Mukharjee and Atanu Bhattacharjee have expressed the view that there were good talents in the North-east but that the players of the region should motivate themselves.

Both the former stars, who are employee of FCI, were in the city to attend a coaching camp organized by the FCI for its football players of the North-east. The camp which concluded at the SAI complex on Saturday was attended by 27 footballers.

Both Atanu Bhattacharjee and Aloke Mukharjee had no doubt that the North-east was full of football talent.

Aloke, who was once the assistant coach of the Indian team at the time of Stephen Constantine, said: “The main advantage of the players of this region is their physical fitness”.

Atanu, who was India goalkeeper for a long time and then national team goalkeeper coach, expressed the same view while advising the players of this region to get ideas about motivating themselves.

Replying to a query he said: “I have seen many footballers form this region in different big clubs of the country and during the initial stage they performed exceptionally well. But what happens I don’t know that after two to three years their performance level start dropping and it could probably be that they fail to bear the pressure that comes about in different ways.”

It may be mentioned here that Asom lad Bilifung Narzary, currently representing the ONGC team, played for Mohun Bagan in one season a few years back and during those days it was Atanu who was the goalkeeper coach of the team.

Thus the former goalkeeper of the Asia All Star XI had the opportunity of having a close look at Bilifung. Commenting on a query on Bilifung, Bhattacharjee said: “He is a very good goalkeeper and I am optimist that in the coming days his performance level would be much high if, of course, he sincerely continues with his efforts”.

Source: The Sentinel