Football club QPR lures city’s footballers

City’s young footballers Shane Aranha and Altamash Valsangkar flew to London on Thursday to train under Championship Club Queens’ Park Rangers’ (QPR) youth development plan. The lads were the winners of the 8th edition of the QPR South Mumbai Junior Soccer Challenger Talent Hunt.

Fourteen-year-old Shane Aranha from Mazgaon was in the news last year for making it to the academy of Argentinian club BOCA Juniors which is Diego Maradona’s boyhood club. Shane comes from a humble background where his father is a compounder at a clinic and his mother is a nurse at a hospital. Donald Aranha, his father, explains that they are not a family with an average income. “Last year when Shane went to Argentina, we were overwhelmed. After we got the news of him going to London, my wife and I were spellbound. The best part is that he is going to all these places because of his talent at such a young age,” says an overjoyed Donald.

The St Mary’s School lad plays in the central midfield with smooth dribbling skills in his corner. Playing in the QPR Academy could be a life changing moment for Shane considering that the Manchester City forward Raheem Sterling went to the same academy before he made it big. The youngster is aware of his opportunities in the capital of England. “I have heard a lot about how different the football is in London but I am up for it. I have seen how the fields are on TV and the stories of players. I will give my best and if scouts are there, it would be my luck,” says the 14-year-old. “In Argentina, I observed that the game was played with higher intensity than compared to India where the football is slow.”

The Mumbai prodigy has been a part of junior tournaments of MDFA and WIFA, putting up an impressive display every time he is on the pitch. “He picked up the game when he was young, winning the best player award at MSSA championships when he was just eight. Since then he has been doing well which is evident I think,” quips his father.

The 8th edition of the QPR-South Mumbai Junior Soccer Challenger 2016 — an initiative by Milind Deora in partnership with QPR — India’s largest community football event. The championship attracted as many as 6,400 children from 165 schools, representing over 800 teams.  Besides, 29 per cent of the participants were girls and as many as 88 per cent of the participants were from municipal and government-aided schools. “The idea was to give kids in South Mumbai a platform to perform in sports. This gives an opportunity for the kids to train abroad,” said Deora.

Close to 60 children were shortlisted for a special talent hunt camp after which these two talented youngsters were selected. QPR, based in White City, London, currently plays in the Championship, the second tier of English football playing at Loftus Road. Their honours include the raising of the League Cup in 1967, as well as being champions of the Championship in 1983 and 2011. Owing to their proximity to other west London clubs, QPR maintain long-standing rivalries with several other clubs in the area. The most notable of these are Chelsea, Fulham and Brentford, of whom they contest what are known as West London Derbies.