By Tenzin Monlam
DHARAMSHALA, June 12: The Tibetan National women’s team today lost the final of the inaugural football tournament for Tibetan women to Khad football team from Una in a penalty shootout after both the team failed to break the deadlock in the stipulated time.
The shootout saw only one goal with eight saves or missed penalty kicks by both the teams. The first penalty kick, which the Tibetan keeper failed to save, was the only goal that decided the match in favor of the Khad team with their custodian saving two penalties.
Both the teams had decent chances to score during the normal playing time. The Tibetan team had a psychological edge over their opponent since they had previously defeated the team by 2 goals to 1 in the group stages.
The captain of the winning team said that they had come into the match with a clear mindset of winning the tournament and had not given much thought on their pervious loss against the same team.
However, Choekyi, captain of the Tibetan women’s team was dejected after the heartbreaking loss to an opponent that they had defeated earlier and also towards her own penalty miss.
“We were sure that we would win since we had beaten them in our previous encounter. Maybe, it was fatigue that limited our performance today,” she said.
Ajay Singh Mankotia, president of Indo-Tibetan Friendship Association (IFTA), attended the event as the chief guest. Also present were members of Tibetan parliament and Dawa Rinchen, the new Tibetan Settlement Officer, Dharamshala.
Kelsang Dhondup, Executive Secretary of Tibetan National Sports Association (TNSA) said that since it was the first ever tournament he did not expect such response given the limited female players in the Tibetan society.
“For the next tournament we are planning to increase the number of Tibetan teams in the tournament,” he said.
The tournament Director also announced Kollegal as the host of the 23rd GCM football tournament to be played in 2017.
