AFVOA Newletter August 2020

Section 5 - Memoirs CV 2 No. 02 / 2020 Page 133 of 237 Probably he had his blessing by Bhagwan to receive awards from well know Prominent Personalities like First Prime Minister Pt Jawahar lal Nehru , First President Dr Rajendra Prasad , Field Marshal Carriappa, Field Marshal SHFJ Manekshaw ,Marshal of IAF Arjan Singh , and Several noted Film/ Cine actors He was the outstanding Goal keeper and won several majors tournaments of south India namely Chakola Gold Trophy, Sait Nagjee Trophy, MUC Tournament, Vittal Trophy. MRC Team was a very powerful team in football in those days and had its major share of contribution to the services team through Southern Command and few MRC players like Alphonse, Aruldas, Peter Thangaraj, Kuppuswamy, Kamatchi were continuously in the playing X1 team GREATEST AND UNFORGOTTEN MATCH The year 1966 was indeed a greatest nostalgic and unforgotten match in his entire life. The Services and Railways meet in finals of 23rd National FOOTBALL TOURNAMENT Santosh Trophy in which my father MRC Goalkeeper D Venkata Reddy was the custodian for Services team in the Goalpost. His senior former Olympian Peter Thangaraj was on the other side in the Indian Railways team. It was a battle between my father and his senior . The game was between Railways and services and indeed the final score was 2-1 with a penalty tie breaker. It was probably the trend setter for my father, a versatile played match, he got his name & photograph in the “Sports & Past time” annual magazine of 1967. where the editor took pains to portray his name & fame in the cover page of the magazine shown below.. .The football game comprises of 11 players on each side and we have two types of combination as follows In the First type.,5 forwards 3 halves, 2 back and one goalkeeper In the second type., 4 forwards, 2 halves, 4 backs, and One goalkeeper The services played the second combination of 4-2-4-1 and Railways were in the first combination of 5-3-2-1 The railway team could not match the deadly dangerous strike rate of the services with all fast forward killing instinct of Gurkha brigade strikers. My father D Venkata Reddy was the Goal Keeper for Services XI and a major share of service team was comprising of Gorkha brigade team stalwarts like