After our FC Goa boys in blue- champions they already are- stole our hearts and made us believe, by reaching the semi finals of the Indian Super league, we have shamed ourselves and let those very boys down by two shameful acts. One, the organizers denied tickets to thousands of football lovers for the second semi finals versus Athletico de Kolkata on Wednesday. And then secondly we did even worse. Some who managed to buy tickets from the counters or online, offered and sold tickets in black.
If passion and love for the game made us do either of these things, we let Goa down and brought down its dignity by several notches. The organisers engaged with the sale of tickets have to explain to the genuine football loving folks of Goa, why such a small number of tickets were kept for sale. While some managed to get online tickets, there were others who battled to get tickets on the first day of the sales and after they failed they made the stadium at Fatorda their bedroom as they slept the night to wake up and stand in line, waiting for the counters to open on day 2. It slowly dawned on them at high noon that those counters would never open because the tickets that were meant for them were never actually meant for them. While the truth will hopefully emerge someday, there seems to be a growing belief that tickets have been hoarded to be palmed off, or worse still, deliberately downsized so that more could be on offer for “special guests”.
But there was another lot who have singularly and cumulatively done worse. And they happen to be so called football fans themselves. Armed with tickets that they managed to buy from any source, they took to Facebook and other forms of social media hawking four hundred rupee tickets for eighteen hundred. When they got refused, they quipped that they stood seven hours to get those tickets. This open sale of tickets in this virtual but real black market, was virtually played out in its naked shamefulness.
If the alleged behavior of those who hoarded tickets caused anger, the decision of relatively young football fans to sell tickets in black was painful. Here is a land which has been regularly described all through the Indian Super League as the spiritual home of Indian football. We have sullied this sanctum sanctorum and made Goa a laughing stock of the rest of the country and even perhaps the world. For sure, word of this fiasco will spread through all the foreign players and the coaches.
The incidents of the past few days takes us back to the seamy ticket-gate scam that took place during the India- Australia one day cricket nternational in 2001 when a large number of duplicate/fake tickets were found. The more one sees what is happening at Fatorda now, the more one is convinced that the culture of false entitlement of those in any sort of power which could even stem from being a panch member in a village panchayat, exists strongly. There is a huge amount of misplaced prestige attached to getting tickets and access to functions and events and accorded a status disproportionate to one’s position or merit. It is that pressure which moves across various points forcing local organisers cut corners and broaden the pool of freebie tickets, leading to a massive cut down on tickets for sale. There was another phenomenon at work here. Many of those with a hold on tickets, and this included some politicians, bought or got tickets and selectively distributed them to their supporters or sycophants. These tickets could well have been carved out from the pool meant for ordinary ticket buyers who stood in line and then spent a night for that all elusive ticket.
Never has Goa seen such passion for football matches in the recent past. The romance of this beautiful game has been felt only through television footage of the English and other leagues and Championships. The Indian I-league is played to empty stands and with almost no live coverage. The ISL has been a game changer literally and our home team has come from behind to take a shot at the championship title itself.
For Goa to be shamed because we could not handle our ticket distribution process, is the greatest let down for our players, our land and above all for those whose lives are all about football. Just football.
