The District Sports Office (DSO) inter-school hockey competition has received poor response across age-groups
Goalkeeper Yugant Sondkar tries to thwart Don Bosco, Matunga's Avinash Patil in the U-14 final. Patil scored a brace. Pic/Suresh KK.
The District Sports Office (DSO) inter-school hockey competition has received poor response across age-groups.
Goalkeeper Yugant Sondkar tries to thwart Don Bosco, Matunga's Avinash Patil in the U-14 final. Patil scored a brace. Pic/Suresh KK.
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Only three teams participated in the Boys U-14 category with Don Bosco (Matunga) beating debutants Ganpatrao Kadam Marg BMC School (Lower Parel) 8-0 in the final at the MHA-Mahindra stadium, Churchgate on Saturday. Safa School was the third team in the meet.
The story is no different with the Girls U-14, Girls U-17, Girls U-19, Boys U-17, and the prestigious U-17 Nehru Cup tournament, with only about five teams taking part in each of these competitions that will conclude on Monday.
Lack of communication
DSO suburb officer Dhanraj Motghare, who managed both the city and suburbs’ tournaments blamed the lack of communication between school authorities for the low turn out.
“DSO had called all PT teachers in the city to brief them about the new rules and developments. PT teachers did not inform the coaches about the rules. For example, this year we had an online registration system in place. We asked schools to send us mails on the e-mail addresses. But the response was poor,” said Motghare.
On the other hand, coaches feel it becomes difficult to field teams in all categories since all the age-group competitions are held within a span of only four days (August 21-25 in this case). Many players are part of different teams, so the work-load on them increases.
Duruelo Convent (Bandra) coach Happy Mann said DSO should streamline the events. “It is not right that six tournaments are conducted simultaneously in a span of four days.
“They should have the DSO tournaments and Nehru Cup on separate days. They can have each age group on a separate day.”
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