Meet Sangrang Brahma, the librarian who has transformed Assam's football

North Eastern states of India are always known for their footballing prowess but one of their states, Assam, was never there at the same league.

But Assam has made its way through to the top echolon of regional football with focus in the grassroots monitored by a librarian named Sangrang Brahma, who is the honorary secretary in the Assam Football Association.

Sangrang was appointed in the position last year after he won the elections in the state FA, and he ramped up the work by revamping the structure of state football soon after helming the hot seat.

In such a short duration football in Assam has seen immense growth. In the Santosh trophy, Assam's men's team topped the group in the first round, that too without conceding a goal in the five matches it played. Assam has qualified for the round robin stage, starting on February 21 in Arunachal Pradesh.

Talking about Assam ascent in the national state championship, Brahma sounded optimistic, 'We did very well at the Santosh Trophy, and now we are ready for the final round. We have included ISL Pragyan Gogoi to the team. We are aiming that the team will make it to the knockout stage."

Brahma is a rare administrator in Indian football whose commitment to the game is not limited to mere lip service; he walked the talk.

"When I become secretary, I saw that the health of Assam football is not good shape, there is no team from our state in the I-League, I-League 2 or any other major football leagues of India. This was very disheartening for me as our neighbouring northeastern states have their teams playing there regularly," Brahma told to The Bridge in an exclusive interview about the condition of his state football.

"Manipur has two teams in the I-League and even smaller states like Mizoram and Meghalaya have also their teams but we don't have," he added.

The first thing Brahma did right after assuming the office was establishing a new state-wide football league, the Assam State Premier League, to help the local talent find a platform to showcase their talent.

"I have decided to give the big platform to our local talent and push one of our own club in I-League, but I also learnt that if you want to play in the national league, you need your own state league, where the champions got nominated first for the I-League 3 and then the upper divisions," Brahma explained why he started the new state league.

Karbi Anglong Morning Star FC became the champion of the first season of the league and earned a nomination for the I-League 3 later this year.

In the beginning, he had to deal with the problem of finding a sponsor for getting the ball roll in the league.

"I started this league after talking to some senior players and few corporate companies for the sponsorships. There were few negative responses in the begining but later we found a PSU (Public Sector Undertaking) company named NRL as our sponsor and then we could successfully conduct our league. They trusted us and gave a sponsorship of 20 lakhs at once which resolved our problem," said Brahma.

New leagues for women and grassroots

Brahma also started a brand new football league for the top women's footballers of the state to make sure women are getting equally opportunities to play football.

"Women are more developed than men," remarked Brahma. "If you see, our women's team has better chances of playing in the World Cup than our boys on the basis of current scenario," he added.

"This was the first-ever women's league for Assam, and now we have now many clubs who have been encouraging their women's teams from all over Assam to play in the league. We successfully held our first edition of the league and also have our inaugural champion who will participate in IWL-2 this season," apprised Brahma.

The inaugural champion of of the Assam Women's League was Karbi Anglong Sports Association Girls FC, who will now get the opportunity to showcase the local talent in front of whole nation at IWL-2 later this year.

No future without grassroots football

"If you don't have grassroots football it means your future is zero, so grassroot leagues are the most important aspect for any football structure. We did not have any teams in U13, U15, U17 national league in past because we never organised any leagues. So, we decided to make a new grassroots structure for the youth football in the state," stated Brahma.

He has also established age group leagues in the state to nurture the future generation of talent.

"We followed the proper guideline of AIFF to conduct our U13, U15 leagues and U17 leagues successfully. Most of these students are from schools so we started picking kids from each and every school of Guwahati city and added a proper football training programme in their daily schedule," Brahma highlighted the extensive work being undertaken in Assam football.

Futsal and beach football for honing skills, technique

Under his visionary leadership, Assam has also introduced the exotic versions of football like futsal and the beach football to its roaster. As these are smaller formats of the game, tournaments under these formats cane be held even in small areas where the big grounds are unavailable.

"Futsal is not very popular in here in Assam. We assembled teams to hold our state league. We invested in the game and luckily we also managed to hold a futsal league and the Guwahati City FC became the first champion to qualify for the national futsal championship. Futsal is such a game which mostly based on your technique and it also increases your speed which helps you when you play on bigger pitches," Brahama opined.

He is also aiming to start a beach football league project on the banks of Brahmaputra river. "We are planning to use the beaches of the river Brahmaputra to start a new beach football league in state from March this year. For this, we are inviting nominations and have already received good responses from the teams."

Optimistic

Brahma is very excited for India's forthcoming FIFA World Cup qualifier fixture against Afghanistan in March which is scheduled to be held at the Indira Gandhi Athletic Stadium in Guwahati. He has urged the fans from across the state to throng the venue and make the qualifier a hit.

"There are a lot of craze for football in Assam, but local players here lack technique; they hey also lack proper coaching. So, we have decided to open our own football academies in the area and are aiming to lead the Assam football to new heights. Firstly, we need to win the Santosh Trophy and make more players from the state to play in the ISL and I-league," Brahma signed off with a pledge.