Asian Blind Football | A former hammer thrower, the Chennai player is now the ‘eye’ of the Indian team
Asian Blind Football | A former hammer thrower, the Chennai player is now the ‘eye’ of the Indian team
When Karen Kirubai saw blind footballers in action for the first time last year, she was shocked. It was organized by the Indian Blind Football Federation. 1st National Championship in Chennai In October 2021 and friends of his father, who had coached Tamil Nadu, wanted him as a goalkeeper. But he refused.
“I was scared because the goalkeeper is the main player in this thing. Then all of a sudden, they dragged me to the IBFF reserve team in the Nationals. That’s how I got into it,” Karen said in a chat Hindu on Wednesday.
To balance the draw at the Nationals, a reserve team was formed with players from other sides. and she gave it to Karen first taste of the game,
“When I looked from outside, I thought I could stop the ball as only blind players were playing. When I went inside I found out the difficulty. You can’t judge where they will shoot. With players with normal vision, you can do justice to their body movements, but that is not the case here,” she said.
“I’ve come here and am learning football now.”
The 21-year-old from Chennai is now one of the two goalkeepers of the Indian women’s team IBSA Blind Football Asia/Oceania Championship which starts on Friday. And with only two women’s teams here, India have already qualified for next year’s Worlds in Birmingham.
Goalkeepers are a strange tribe in blind football. They are the only players who can see! They are completely sighted while the other four – blind football being a fives game – are completely blind and even have their eyes covered to make it a level playing field.
“The goalkeeper is the eye of the team, he has to position the players,” he said.
Karen was earlier a good hammer thrower, competing in state-level meets, but the global pandemic put a halt to it. However, it has been a blessing.
“Being a thrower, he has good throwing power. In this football, 70 percent The game is how the goalkeepers feed you the ball. She has a good hand, she can throw the ball well,” Vikram Singh, national champion Maharashtra coach and the Indian team’s ‘goal guide’ said here.
But Keren also had language problems.
“What’s important is how the keeper communicates with the players, how they guide them,” Vikram said.
“When I first joined the camp, I didn’t know Hindi,” reveals Karen. “And everyone here knew only Hindi. Now I am learning Hindi from him and he is learning English from me. Everyone is comfortable.”