The famous FIVE who saved East Bengal from going to debris

Just the other day East Bengal and it’s administration ruling the club did celebrate it’s 1^st day of it’s 100 years of existence in football.There were many of the good olden days who were felicitated on that day There were many of this generation who were also felicitated on that great day . There were the club officials, there were the elites of the zone’s who made East Bengal what it appears to be .

However if at all if a thorough probe and an analytical study is made and if an attempt is mafde about to find out who were the one’s who really saved East Bengal from going to debris there would be those five and I’m to explain and write to you all to read about those five who really saved East Bengal from going to debris.

History:

It has been described by me about how East Bengal fought the British administration tooth-&-nail for it’s survival.That part of the commentary is over East Bengal really were put to the ashes after 1963 when for all practical purpose Balram bid good-bye to Indian football and all the norms and the forms of football     

Again the start of the 1966 was even bad . Sunil nandi and Aroon Ghosh for all practical purpose joined B N Railways for their job and East Bengal were left with none to fend for.Some attempt was made to bring Asim mallik to the team but that failed and the last of the failure came when Sukalyan Ghosh Dastidar too refused to join East Bengal.He was promised by the Mohun Bagani’s that they would get him a job in ther Bank for his career and that made him to do the turn East Bengal was really reduced to pulp and was absolutely on the brink of disaster to face However the effort made by the club official’s then especially by J C Guha turned the fortunes of the club There were som who had come to East Bengal and I start one by one to describe them

Those described here proved to the HEART that pumped the blood of East Bengal to keep them afloat

A ) >  Mohammed Habib : Heart that pumped bllod for East Bengal and was a heart throb

He was noticed by Mr Late J C Guha in the Nizam Gold Cup which was played at Hyderabad . He was just 17 years of age when he was playing for City Boy’s Old College team in that tourney. His attitude and his quality was such that it took just a minute for Mr J C Guha to decide that he would be the first one that would sign for East Bengal for the 1966-67 season Habib along with Syed Naimuddin signed for East Bengal in 1966.

When Habib came to play for East Bengal it had Parimal Dey at the upfront, came in Kali Babu Verma, East Bengal somehow brought Guru Kripal Singh from Mohun Bagan, Ram Bahadur was in his very last phase or the fag end phase as we call it and there were Santo Mitra, Peter Thangaraj, Sunil Bhattacharjee, Kajal Mukherjee, Prasanta Sinha and Ashoke Lal Banerjee Most of them were either the defenders or the goalkeepers.

It was left to Mohammed Habib to deliver. He did that. In the very first match that he played for East Bengal at Kolkatta he scored two and helped the others in scoring two. In the very first match that he played he showed his true element. His speed was a treat, his dribbling in a very short space, his accuracy and the ball control, the way he would burst in a sudden speed to receive the ball, the way he would latch on to the ball, the way he would accurately pass the ball, the way he would create the gaps to move up, and the way he would open up near the goal to score had an impression of what we call it a class of it’s own

He simply played single handedly for East Bengal upfront and he made every possible attempt to score for East Bengal whenever it needed be . Such was his contribution to the club that in those days between 1966 to 1971 when he played for East Bengal if East Bengal in a match would touch the ball 1000 times Habib would touch it for 500 times That was his game and his involvement for the team

He switched to Mohun Bagan in 1967 only to come back to East Bengal in 1968 again to go to Mohun Bagan in 1969 but from 1970 to 1975 till the end of the season he was with East Bengal A word “ GADDAR “ referred to him in a match where East Bengal drew their first IFA League match against Mohammedan Sporting in 1974 when he missed a very east sitter against Mohammedan Sporting for which the match ended in a draw , pained him so much that he let East Bengal in 1975 to join Mohammedan Sporting and in 1977 he joined Mohun Bagan. He came back to East Bengal in 1980 to go to Mohun Bagan in 1981 again to come back to East Bengal in 1982 and from there he joined Tata Football Club in 1983 to play for them till 1985 from where he retired from football

He later was the coach of Tata Football Academy from 1987 to 1997 . He won 47 football titles while playing for East Bengal and Mohun Bagan His greatest contribution was in 1980 when a host of East Bengal players had deserted the club to join Mohammedan Sporting and he decided to join East Bengal That year East Bengal did not loose to any other teams from India and he scored thw two most important goals when East Bengal won the Fed Cup sharing it with Mohun Bagan in 1980 and the Rovers Cup as well .

Habib is the FIRST footballer of India to have scored ten goals against Mohun Bagan in his entire career . He was very disciplined, very focused, and a 100% team man who only played the game to give much more to the game rather than taking it away from it. His GREATEST moment was when King Pele asked him whether he

would be interested to play in the European League as a professional after the Mohun Bagan- Cosmos match He refused the offer from Pele saying that he was a professional footballer and that he was very happy playing at India for the Indian club

Habib played for 9 seasons for East Bengal and out of the 47 national level trophies that he won in his entire career he won 26 of them fopr East Bengal .That was his contribution for East Bengal Especially between the period from 1966 when he joined the club till about 1970 when he again came back to the club, in 1966, 1968 to cite as an example, he was the one who had held East Bengal in it’s forward line

For his contribution to Football and to India in football he was awarded the Arjuna Award as well as East Bengal awarded him the East Bengal Gaurav .

B ) > Samaresh Choudhury  : The Flowerpot which created converted buds into fragrance flowers

Ram Bahadur had retired from East Bengal in 1967 and there was ONE question- who would be the next one to take that position of Ram Bahadur . Ram Bahadur was an EAGLE who soared up and up whenever he played for East Bengal He was perhaps the BEST of the midfielder in that position for India and  for East Bengal He had many a tales to be scripted as an midfielder but his contribution for East Bengal just could not be wriiten so easily

Ram Bahadur after he left the scene there was a question in everybody’s lips whether East Bengal will vere get a midfielder at all to fill in the breach created by Ram Bahadur .The answer came soon when in 1967 after leaving the Wari Football Club Samaresh Choudhury on the insistence of Bagha Shome, joined East Bengal Samaraesh known as Pintuda was coached by Bagha Shome and he really was a torpedo when it came to being a midfielder to control the game for East Bengal.

He had his problems with his body weight Many said initially that he would not be able to play for a very long time for East Bengal and that his football career was short But this man played for East Bengal from 1967 to 1979 and again in 1981.From 1979 to the end of 1981 he was in Mohammedan Sporting but he ended palying for East Bengal in 1981 and in his last game for East Bengal he scored a goal along with Majid Bhaskar in that 2-0 victory against a club side in the IFA League

Pintuda as he is called and known NEVER charged even a single penny from the club from 1970 to 1975. He on the contorary paid fom his pocket to get Joseph Machado playing for the club and he never was taken very seriously by the club authorities when it came to payment Yet this man from 1967 when that position fell vacant after ram Bahadur left the scene not only played what we call it a feast of a very high ytechnical football but he sprang a surprise by giving birth to Mohan Singh, Gautam Sarkar and Prosanto Banerjee who playing alongside with him went in to become very grand footballer and a household name in Indian football.

Completely controlling the midfield, spraying the ball either by one-touch-long kicks to keep their forwards on the move and the prowl, or bisecting the midfield and holding the ball by his cute little sweet dribbles, accurate defense splitting passes, and reading the moves of the opponent to nip their moves in the buds, this man who was a question of conjecture to many as to and whether would he be able to do anything in football from 1970 to 1979 and again in 1981 won  about 26 titles on the national scales for East Bengal in which the TRIPLE CROWN was the added feather to his crowns of titles that he won for the club

Especially in the period between 1967 when he joined the club till 1971 when East Bengal were really struggling to find another good midfielder to assist the team in the various tourneys, the way he played and controlled the proceedings along with Mohammed Habib, it was a treat and it requires as HEART of GOLD to write that he was the mainstay for East Bengal in the midfield line

He wept TEARS openly and publicly when he was asked to get out of the club in 1979 However he once again came back to the club in 1981 from where he bid adieu to the game He played for Mohammedan Sporting for two season and helped them to win the DCM Trophy in 1980 when Victor Amalraj was their captain in 1980. He was the ONLY one a footballer of it’s kind who DID not carry any pressureor wilt under it,  or any palpitation while playing any kind of a football match . no matter how BIG or HARD an opponent would be

He was never given his due and he never earned any applause for the contribution that he gave it to football as a GEM and a JEWEL of a player beside being a JEWEL of a human being that he is Infact he could be easily ONE of the FIVE GREATEST midfielder to have played football for East Bengal

1. > Sudhir Kormokar : The Patton of East Bengal

It was the year 1967 when a young boy aged about 17 went to Achyut Banerjee to seek his advise and guidance about what would  it would be to join a very heavyweight team like East Bengal  

“If you do not join now when do yo expect to join after you are 35 years of age , that was the reply he got”. Look at Mohammed Habib and Subhash Bhowmik. They joined East Bengal whe they were 17 but do you think that you need to wait for another 17 years before you would join  them.

It was Achyut Banerjee who pumped all the confidence in then a man named Sudhir Kormokar and he made up his mind to join East Bengal. Very lean, thin and a player whose height was not more than 5 feet 5 inch , he joined East Bengal in 1967

He was with east Bengal in 1967 but switched over to Mohun  Bagan at the insistence of Mr J C Guha who advised him that East Bengal with that kind of a players who were rock solid in the defense like Syed Naimuddin, Sunil Bhattacharjee, Ashoke Lal Banerjee , he would get no chance or very little to play .To gain in match experience he advised him to join Mohun Bagan and horne his skill. He was at Mohun bagan in 1968 and in 1969 before Mr J C Guha again advised him to come back to the club in 1970. From 1970 to 1976 he was a regular player for East Bengal . He was dismissed from the club in 1976 when he joined Mohun Bagan . He remained with them till 1980 when in 1980 after a barrage of East Bengali players dedeserted the club and joined Mohammedan Sporting . From then till 1983 he was with East Benagl and he bid good bye to this game in 1983 after winning the coveted Arjuna Award for his contribution to the game of football for India and the clubs he played for.

He could very easily play in all the three position as a Central Stopper, a right wing half as well as a left wing half . He was chosen by all the coaches to play in the wing flank position of the halves and there he was simple and cruel, both.  His greatest ability was that he could read the moves of the opponent very fast and he would be at the right place at the right time to take on his opponent. His reflexes, his anticipations, his off and with the ball kind of the game, his tackles , his long passes and his runs through the flanks were indescribable. His act was that of an act where one just touches the silk and feels the smoothness of it. His was always a feline tough which had the impact of the Patton tank

His greatest act was when playing for India against japan for the hardline Bronze Medal in the 6^th Asian Games at Bangkok in 1970 he completely bottled Jan Kammamotto. In that game which was played for entire 95 minutes, he did not allow that GREAT Japanese to even touch the ball whenever they faced each other in a one-to-one situation. Leave apart allowing him to touch the ball, he never gane that Great Japanese to even turn aroung with the ball. So confused Kammammotto was that after the game that GREAT Japanese footballer wanted to gift him an souvenier after the match but ended gifting it to Subash Bhowmik. That was the turn of the brain and the sence he had caused to Kammamotto on that day

He never believed in tackling hard.It was just an touch like the feather touches the body That was the kind of the touch he would provide to the ball while tackling his opponent and they would go swirling and 

swindling off the air and their balance For that was the audacity with which he had grafted and groomed himself as a very dependable and an organized defender

When he finally took over the charge for East Bengal, the East Bengal goalkeepers at times were found sleeping under the bar.That happened on September 25^th1975 when Tarun Bose was caught napping under the bar when East Bengal hammered Mohun Bagan, ie ,  them by 5-0 . On that day Sudhir Kormokar was simply unbelievable infact strolling and walking with Samaresh Choudhury to move up or fall back to nip the Mohun Bagani’s in their bud. Any brilliant forwards, be it the Japanese, the Iranians,  the Koreans, the Russians/USSR, the Germans, the Malaysians or the Thais who played in any game against East Bengal from 1970 to 1975 were squared off with all the credits and the debits equally balanced in their balance sheet  

The art of reading the mind and the situation of the players in terms of the opponent and then playing that kind of a game so cleanly and so neatly thereafter then, to completely diffuse the opponent,  was something which propmpted the Chief of FIFA then, Sir Alf ramsay to pronounce that Sushir Kormokar was infact the BEST defender from the Asian Sub Continent that he could ever see an Asian playing football at the defense line.

The East Bengal team from 1970 from the day that they beat the PAS Club Iran by 1-0 in the finals of the IFA Sheild, to and till 1976 would not just bother about anything and anybody with Sushirda at the defense.They knew immediately aftter taking the field against their opponent that they are ahead by atleast two goals against their opponents .That was the impact this small little man created to become perhaps the GREATEST ever Indian defender born in the annals of Indian football to play  in that position.

There is a chord that bemuses and confuses everybody when one writes about this diminutive steel made Indian defender. He would not practice and he never believed in training and practice. He would always say his coaches that discount my practice session as I do not have in me for practicing that hard.Pin your faith on me and I will never let you down.That he did it even when Mr P K Banerjee, Mr Arun Ghosh or anybody would be his coach.

He was awarded the Arjuna Award for his contribution to the game.

 D ) > Manoranjan Bhattacharjee: The GREATEST wall of East Bengal

It was first in the year 1974 when an Indian football team to play in the Asian School Football Championship was announced and a lad aged 16 then was selected to represent India. Then came 1975 and he was in the West Bengal Police team to play for them as an invitee in some football tourneys.He then was in George Telegraph in 1976 when he played in that infamous IFA Shield semis against East Bengal when they were beaten by 2-5 in that semis against East Bengal. One more season in 1976 with a Police team and in 1977 he was in and with East Bengal. That was the season when Bhaskar Ganguly was to permanently play for East Bengal and from then we had the duo of Mona-Bhaskar. This is and this duo is an unsurmountable FOLKLORE of all the TALES and the PARABES that one could write it for East Bengal.

Weight maintained constant at 80 kilograms in his playing days, height at about 5 feet 10 inches, chest measuring 46 inches during his playing days, endurance maintained exactly to play for 120 minutes non-stop, the fist that could blow off any good and hard substance in one punch, and the body as if it was made of steel, this man from 1977 to 1991 and then again in 1993 came back to give every ounce of flesh and every drop of his perspiration in terms of everything that he had to give Bengal, it’s Six Santosh Trophy, to give Mohun Bagan it’s five Trophy that he pl;ayed for them and to give East Bengal a total of 40 trophies as a player and as a coach.

This 51 Trophies that he won in his entire footballing carrer is the HIGHEST and the MOST that any football player has won in terms of the gliterring ttrophies in his entire career and this is a WORLD RECORD .  No other football playe in his entire career has won so many a trophies as a footballer or someone as who played and was associated with football.

The greatest attribute of this man was he was terrific both in the air as well as on the ground.His readings of the moves, his readings of the players as to what he would do next and what ought to be done to completely nullify him, his reading of the formatoion of the team and the places from where they would attack, his readings of the floaters as to what kind of a dip would it take, how would be the rotation, and the spin of the ball when in flight, the deviation that it would take, the swereves that it would carry and what would be the exact position that I would have to be to nip in that moves were so accurate and so precise that he was adjudicated as the BEST defender of Asia in 1980 after the Pre-Olympic Soccer  for his display ,at Singapore then , along with Bhaskar Ganguly who was adjudicated as the BEST Goalkeeper then after that tourney .

The glorious moment for East Bengal and for him came in the 1980 when after a host of galaxies had deserted East Bengal then, he singlehandedly took the charge of the East Bengal team at the defense and produced unbelievable brand of soccer to completely produce unbelievable result for East Bengal then

At a stage when it appeared for all reason that he would desert the club in 1980, he stayed with the club abd produced something what we could terms it as EIGHT WONDER OF THE WORLD in terms of the performance

Another GREATEST of the GREAT that we could see with our naked eye was the display of India against Argentina in the Jawaharlal Nehru Cup at the Edens Garden in 1984 when it took the World Champion Argentina then fielding a WORLD TEAM which had to wait for 86 minutes to get that goal against India. It happened when an Argentine inflicted a professional football foul to send Monada away from the field and within the time he came back after nursing that injury, the Argentines through Gareca had scored to beat India.On that day he completely had punctured and fused the Argentines so badly at the defense that they were all in loss for sense. So lost were their players that during the half time one of the Argentine came running to the Indian organisers to ask and request them to take him to the hotel as he had to go to the toilet.When that player was taken to the toilet that eden gardens player pavilion had did he recievd and gained sense.That player was nobody except Burruchaga who had scored that goal against West Germany then in their 3-2 victory over them to win that World Cup for Argentina. That was the kind of a game he played on that day

With Monada as and at the defense East Bengal was never to wroory at all. They knew that the team was always one goal ahead with Bhaskar at the goal and Monada at the back.It was Shyam Thapa on that day when East Bengal beat George Telegraph by 5-2 in the semis of the IFA Shield who predicted a great future for this man and what a performance did he produce as a footballer at the defense. A ball of fire at the ground when in business, he was a GREATEST WALL of East Bengal’s defense till he played football for East Bengal and very hard to beat

E ) >  Majid Bhaskar : The Rear-Guard Action Of One Act Play

Written as Majid Bhaskar and pronounced as Majid Bashkar .Is that not a head swirling act.If that is, that was he when he played football and he was a complete class in terms of mastery and in terms of the game that he would exhibit when he played the game

Coming here at Jabalpur first to study, moving to Aligarh Muslim University to make them the champion of Ashutosh Mukherjee football and then finally puttinghis feet at Kolkata to pl;ay for East Bengal from 1980 to 1982 for 2 season and then for Mohammedan Sporting from 1982 to 1986 for four season, Majid

infact was a GOD send blessing for East Bengal, for Indian football which we PURPOSELY destroyed it.The LOSS was of Indian football and ofcourse his personal loss.

A player who just did not do any mistake, not even one while playing, a player who was so accurate while playing the game, and a player who was infact five years ahead of Indian football when he came to play this game in India, Majid Bhaskar  played the kind of a game while playing two years of football for East Bengal which many had not played even while they might have played for East Bengal playing for about ten years for them.

His off the ball run, his on the and with the ball run, his quarter turns, his semi turns, his receiving the ball, passing the ball, creating gaps, creating moves, halting the moves and then reshaping it with a different creativity, the more you think to describe this man, the more you loose your adjectives and the words. He was really an unimaginable class of a footballer whose qualities as a footballer ws there in the sky when the other Indian footballers were not even able to place them firmly on the groiund. He was not that a speedy player but the way he controlled the ball on his feet and the way he pushed it around with the bare minimum effort and producing the maximum impact out of it were really a class

Watching Majid Bhaskar play was like watching the 24 carats of the gold producing the refractive index of the maximum degree that emits out of the diamond

Not given any chances by anybody and hardly to name about in terms of the player then in 1980, Majid joined East Benagl in 1980 and he single handedly carried the team from the position of obscurity to the maximum of the height of it’s destiny .

It is said and it is believed that the ONE-ACT-PLAY never and never has any rearguard action. But Majid always proved it wrong. The other would spring into action when he was on move be it with the ball be it without it. The players playing with him would start running like a stag and the players playing against him would start behaving like a leopard who was without it’s food for a month before he got Majid to block him for his prey That was the repercussions that he would create on the field when he was really on the song for time long with the ball

He completely put the Indian football behind by five years while he played this game for East Bengal and he completely took East Bengal ahead by five years while he played for them His contribution for East Bengal was the Fed Cup and the Rovers Cup shared with Mohun Bagan and Mohammedan Sporting in 1980. Not even even an inch of a chance by anybody in 1980 East Bengal in that year did not loose even a single game against anybody to win those two cups/trophies, and it was the IFA Shield , the Darjeeling Gold Cup where they shared the trophy with Mohun Bagan and beat them and again the Stafford Cup in 1981 at Bangalore where they shared the Trophy with Mohammedan Sporting.

East Bengal had it’s epic era ( 1920 to 1938 ), it has it’s primitive era ( 1940 to 1969 ) and it’s Silver era ( 1980 to 2004 ) but the DIAMOND ERA ( 1970 to 1976 ) actually it was where East Bengal looked that weak in some department of the game and it never appeared that East Bengal really would create that kind of the history and these were the players of that era, the Diamond Era of East Bengal and the era after that wherte these players mentioned  here appeared somewhere out from the blue and took East Bengal to remain where the people expected them to. This was the era from 1970 to 1986 where East Bengal really had to survive without any oxygen with them and thee five players made it possible to help East Bengal where it ought to be standing on the expectatioons of it’s supporter .

There was one more, by the name of Ram Bhadur Chettri from 1953 -54 to 1967 but Ram Bahadur Chettri had the pancha-Pandavas playing then for East Bengal along with Ahmed Khan and though his effort was not any little than the one’s mentiond here the fact is there were those I have named here when Ram Bahahdur was playing for East Bengal and his place ws taken by Majid Bhaskar for whom I had to write here.