Good luck to skipper Venkatesh and his boys. The Mahindra United captain and playmaker is an experienced guy. In Mahesh Gawli, Sameer Naik and Bibiano Fernandes the team has intelligent readers of the game who should do well in the coming matches in Canada.
In his hey days coach Shri Marcus Pacheco was a tower of strength in the goal for the Mormugao Port Trust and the Goa State teams. He can certainly impart his rich experience to the Indian goalies under his care.
The assistant coach Shri Mauricio Affonso is a known legend of our time. The former India skipper and long time Dempo stalwat has tons and tons of experience at the highest level in our country. His incisive passes, foresight and ability to change the course of the game were his greatest virtues during his illustrious carrier in Indian soccer. In his heydays when colleagues had the ball and knew not what to do with it, they would religiously pass it on to Mauricio and he would work it out for them in a very intelligent and constructive way.
The superb ongoing World Cup matches should fire our footballers to dream big. Best wishes to coach Bob Houghton, the players and all the members of the support staff.
