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National Football Tournament
Published on Apr 22 2006
Report
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This years National Football Tournament was hosted by the Middlesex Region and was held on April 23, 2006 at Upton Court Park, Slough. The opening session commenced at 10.45am, which was chaired by Sadr Majlis Khuddamul Ahmadiyya UK.
The Teams There were a total of 11 teams that had expressed an interest to participate in this years competition. There were four seeded teams, which were taken from last years top four. The regions that were represented were:
The teams were oranised into two groups – one group of six and one group of five due to the uneven number of team and matches were played on four pitches.. Preliminaries The preliminaries started after 11am on a blustery, cold and wet morning - perfect conditions for football nonetheless. The tournament officials were impressed with the level of skill shown by some of the players - there was a marked improvement in the players’ ability since last year’s tournament in Cardiff. Games ran fairly smoothly and we managed to finish all preliminary games before the start of lunch … just! As per the tournament rules, the top four from each group would go through to the quarter-final knock-out stages. Pasta was served for lunch at approximately 2pm, after which prayers were offered in congregation.
Knock out Stages At 3pm we began the knock out stages. There were four games in total – the pick of the bunch was East against the surprise package – the Ansar team. The Ansar put up a tremendous fight and were being cheered on by all the onlookers but unfortunately the strength and depth of the East squad was too empowering as they won 3-0 with two goals from Faraz Sethi and one from Humayon Mirza to seal the victory. In the other quarter-finals, Middlesex saw of South 3-0, North West put Midlands surprise run to an end by beating them 3-0 and Baitul Noor beat Islamabad convincingly 3-0 to set up two mouth-watering semi finals. Semi Finals
The semi-finals paired up Middlesex and Baitul Noor and East and North West. The Middlesex and Baitul Noor affair was a close call. Both teams were strong and there was little between them. Despite having home advantage, Baitul Noor took advantage of some confusion in the Middlesex defence to take a 1-0 lead. However, moments later, Middlesex equalised through Soaib to bring the game all-square. That’s how the game finished and the game was taken to extra-time golden goal. Both teams created a number of chances but Soaib managed to get in behind the defence to finish low and hard in the bottom left hand corner to send Middlesex through to their second consecutive final. The other semi-final was a repeat of the opening group game in Group A, which had finished one a piece. Therefore this time it was all to play for … and East did not get of to the greatest of starts, as they did not arrive onto the pitch in time. North West were given a 1-0 lead, as per the tournament ruling. Things got from bad to worse for East, as they fell 2-0 behind after some sloppy defending. Faraz Sethi volley, however, brought the game back to 2-1 at the break and the second half was dominated by East. East's midfield and forward line linked up well – both Sabah and Yasser worked hard in the midfield distributing balls for both Faraz and Humayon Mirza to latch onto with Anil Tahir holding the East defence together. It was a turn around in fortunes, as within 5 minutes, Faraz Sethi had scored a total of 4 goals in the game taking his tally to 8 for the entire competition. The game ended with East winning 5-2.
The Final
This set up the final – last years tournament winners and hosts Middlesex against the current and reigning Ijtema champions, East – a tremendous prospect. The game as everyone imagined was a very tight and close affair – there were very few chances in the game but a moment of quick thinking between Humayon Mirza and Faraz Sethi led to the one key moment which won East the game – a short corner by Faraz to Humayon was put into the path of Faraz who running onto the ball, hit the ball into the far post over the head of the Middlesex goalkeeper. Despite being 1-0 down, Middlesex did not give up the fight. They came very close through Waqas in the dying minutes who weaved his way through four of the East team, crossing the ball across the face of the goal but to no avail. Middlesex were unable to take their chances and eventually lost the game 1-0. Final Session
The session commenced with the recitation of the Holy Quran, followed by the pledge and the tournament report delivered by Middlesex Regional Qaid. The prize distribution followed thereafter – the Player of the Tournament was awarded to Humayon Mirza, which was a collective decision by all of the referees who officiated in the tournament. The Golden Boot Award was presented to Faraz Sethi who scored a total of 9 goals. The captain of Middlesex, Masroor Ahmed received the runners-up prize and the winners cup was accepted by East Region’s captain, Tahir Mirza. A special prize was also given to the Ansar team on a commendable achievement for reaching the knock-out stages – Mahmood Mirza Sahib accepted the prize. Tariq Ahmad BT Sahib who watched the final, mentioned that he had seen a significant improvement in the level of footballing ability within the Jama’at. The tournament concluded with silent prayer. Everyone eagerly awaits next years tournament, which promises to be an even better affair inshallah! Statistics for the Day:
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