By Mayukh Goswami

Mangaldai : Much to the need of the unexplored  potential young footballers of Mangaldai and its surrounding areas , Mangaldai Sports Association(MSA), a pioneer Sports Body in Lower Assam for the first time in its  long history  has come forward to run a full time football academy under the supervision of  national level coaches  from NIS . Pabitra Ram Khaund, Director of Sports and Youth Welfare, Govt of Assam, on Sunday afternoon ceremonially  launched the academy along with a ten day long  free summer coaching camp  at Mangaldai stadium  in presence of several prominent persons , veteran sports organizers and footballers  including MLA Mangaldai, Gurujyoti Das, Secretary Mangaldai Sports Association Anupam Deka, Biren Medhi, Dr Amarendra Narayan Deb among others.

While talking to the APN on Monday, Bipul Kr Sarma, Football Secretary of the premier sports body expressed delight over the tremendous response from the promising local young footballers in between the age group from six to sixteen years to enroll their names  in the academy which has started functioning parallel to the summer coaching camp with NIS coach Utpal Das as the chief trainer . ‘ We are all set to run the academy on a regular basis under the technical help and guidance from the Directorate of Sports , Assam Government . They have assured us to provide NIS coaches like Ganesh Rai , Jewel Bey , Debashis Roy etc from time to time to guide our local regular coaches comprising Physical Instructors (PT) of the Sports Department and former prominent footballers. We are very delighted to find the keen interest of the younger generation for football as today on the next day of the inauguration more than two hundred trainees have enrolled their names  ”

On  the same day the Sports Body at its stadium premises  has also launched a new Table Tennis Academy as well as a training camp under the technical  supervision of  (NIS)coach Ashutosh Chodhury  at Mangaldai stadium. Here also a total of twenty young  TT players have enrolled their names . This academy also is expected to explore the young TT players of the region where there was reportedly no arrangement of TT training after 1995 .