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The Goa Football Association 2017/18 season gets underway with the GFA Champions Trophy Charity Match at the Duler Stadium in Mapusa on Sunday afternoon at 4pm.
The Goa Pro League champions Salgaocar FC will lock horns with Goa Police Cup winners FC Bardez in the curtain raiser of the upcoming season.
“The Goa Football Association is all set for the 2017/18 season. Tomorrow’s match marks the beginning of the 2017/18 season. We wish both the teams good luck,” said GFA General Secretary Welvin Menezes.
“The tickets are priced at Rs 50 and Rs 200. The tickets for the match will be available at the venue. I would like to urge the crowd and fans of the both the teams to come out in large to mark the beginning of the 2017-18 season,” said Welvin Menezes.
Welvin Menezes also revealed, “the beneficiary of the Charity Match will be the family of late Kevoy Fernandes, former referee and coach whose life was cut short in a tragic accident leaving behind his wife and a young son. This is the first time that the Charity Match beneficiary will be for the match officials.”
Salgaocar FC who has promoted 15 of their youth team products into the senior team will face their first test on Sunday.
“We have retained few of our experienced players in Lenny Pereira, Brian Mascrenhas, Rosario Mendes, Gilbert Oliveira. But this season we have more of the youth team players in the main squad. This will be the platform for the youngsters,” said Salgaocar FC general secretary Adlear D’Cruz.
Salgaocar FC enjoy an impressive record over their rivals FC Bardez whom they have defeated in all their previous meetings in the Goa Pro League last season.
However, this time, the Bardez team will face a new-look Greens, while FC Bardez coached by Armando Colaco has made a drastic change to their squad as well by only retaining five players from the 2016/17 squad in Jessel Carneiro, Lenstan Afonso, Shubham Rao Dessai, Kritikesh Gadekar and Jesmon Soares.
Lenstan Afonso said, “The squad has changed but we will give out all. We have lost to them in the previous meetings but we won’t let it happen again.”
The curtain raiser is followed by AWES Cup from September 1 while the Goa Pro-League will commence in the last week of September or first week of October.
Meanwhile, the GFA U-20 Taca Goa league will begin from September 18.
