The Subroto Cup International Football Tournament is a prestigious international inter-school

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kick (football), kicking a football (ball), ball to score a goal (sports), goal. Unqualified, football (word), the word ''football'' generally means the form of football t ...

tournament that is held in

New Delhi New Delhi (; ) is the Capital city, capital of India and a part of the Delhi, National Capital Territory of Delhi (NCT). New Delhi is the seat of all three branches of the Government of India, hosting the Rashtrapati Bhavan, New Parliament ...

, India. The tournament held annually since 1960, is named after the

Indian Air Force The Indian Air Force (IAF) (ISO 15919, ISO: ) is the air force, air arm of the Indian Armed Forces. Its primary mission is to secure Indian airspace and to conduct aerial warfare during armed conflicts. It was officially established on 8 Octob ...

Air Marshal

Subroto Mukerjee Subroto Mukerjee ( Bengali: সুব্রত মুখোপাধ্যায়) (5 March 1911 – 8 November 1960) was an Indian military officer who was the first Indian Commander-in-Chief (C-in-C) of the Indian Air Force. He was awarded ...

. It is the oldest national school football tournament in India and was instituted to promote and encourage the sport at the grassroots level in the country. Students from different countries across

Asia Asia ( , ) is the largest continent in the world by both land area and population. It covers an area of more than 44 million square kilometres, about 30% of Earth's total land area and 8% of Earth's total surface area. The continent, which ...

participate in this tournament, making it one of the more noteworthy school-level football competitions.

History

conceived the idea in 1958 when he was the Chief of the Air Staff. Subroto Mukerjee Sports Education Society was formed in 1960

Organisation

The Subroto Cup is conducted by the

, with the help of Ministry of Youth Affairs & Sports.

Tournament structure

The current tournament structure consists of the preliminary inter-school tournaments at different divisional levels culminating in the inter-school finals at the state level. The winners then participate in the main national tournament.

Venues

The venues for the tournament held at

: *

Ambedkar Stadium Dr. Ambedkar Stadium is a football stadium in New Delhi, India. The stadium is named after Dr. B. R. Ambedkar, social reformer and architect of the Indian Constitution. It was earlier known as Corporation Stadium. It has held competitions like ...

* Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium *Tejas Football Ground (Race Course) *Subroto Park

International Participation

School teams from numerous countries have played in the tournament, with the first team reaching the final in 1993 being the Special Sports School from Uzbekistan. Since then many schools from foreign countries take part regularly, such as Brazil, Indonesia, Afghanistan, Nepal, Ukraine, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Bhutan etc. In the 2015 Championship, for the first time teams of boys and girls came from

Afghanistan Afghanistan, officially the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, is a landlocked country located at the crossroads of Central Asia and South Asia. It is bordered by Pakistan to the Durand Line, east and south, Iran to the Afghanistan–Iran borde ...

for the tournament. Brazilian legend and football's elder statesman Pele came to India after a gap of 38 years to attend the final of the 56th edition of the Subroto Cup as the chief guest. In 2016,

Rivaldo Rivaldo Vítor Borba Ferreira (; born 19 April 1972), known simply as Rivaldo, is a Brazilian former footballer who played mainly as an attacking midfielder but also as a second striker, and on occasion deployed as a wide midfielder or as ...

and

Roberto Carlos Roberto Carlos da Silva Rocha (born 10 April 1973), often known as Roberto Carlos and sometimes ''RC3'', is a Brazilian former professional association football, footballer. He has been described as the "most offensive-minded left-back in the ...

were the chief guests at the 57th edition.

Results

Junior (U–17)

The following is the list of winners and runners-up:

Sub–Junior (U–15)

At the request of the School Games Federation of India, the Subroto Cup organisers started a sub-junior (11-14 Years) football tournament from 1998. Sixteens teams participated in the inaugural tournament, while more schools took part in the following years. Since 2000, the fairplay trophy for the sub-junior group has been named in the memory of late Lieutenant Sandeep Loomba, who died in a mountaineering expedition at

Abi Gamin Abi Gamin (also known as Ibi Gamin) is a Himalayan mountain peak mostly situated in the Chamoli district of Uttarakhand state in India, roughly northeast of Kamet. Its summit is on the border with Tibet and its northern slope is in the Ngar ...

peak. Fairplay trophy for the junior group, medals and certificates for both the age groups, are provided by the Subroto Society

Girls Junior (U–17)

References

External links

Official website
* {{Football in India Football cup competitions in India Youth football competitions Youth football in India 1960 establishments in India Recurring sporting events established in 1960 History of the Indian Air Force