The Air Force School’s (TAFS) dominance at school level soccer in the Capital is well documented through their performances in local tournaments as well as the Subroto Cup. But this year has belonged more to an individual than the whole team. Uttam Rai, on Monday, capped the successful year for his team with a hat-trick in TAFS’s 5-0 victory in the DSA inter-school tournament final over Scottish High International School at the Race Course Ground.

He helped TAFS mount pressure from the very beginning assisting Dilliram open the account and then scored three consecutive goals before Lalnunthara completed the mauling later in the second half. The Sikkim boy, a frontrunner to make the Delhi sub-junior team for the Mir Iqbal Hussain Trophy, also topped the event’s goal-scoring charts with 13 strikes.

Incidentally, the 14-year-old became the first player from the Subroto Cup Academy to sign a deal with Switzerland’s Grasshopper Club Zurich (GCZ) last August. He was picked as a member of the club’s under-15 squad on the basis of his performance with the touring Subroto XI for a training programme staring next February. Rai will be in Europe for two months of pre-season and four months of league football before further assessment of his performance. Rai’s name also figured in the list of under-14 scholarship getters of the last Subroto Cup.

Trials for Mir Iqbal Hussain Trophy
Meanwhile, the Delhi state team, to be picked from the ongoing camp for selected players, will participate in the 32nd Sub Junior (North Zone) National Championship 2009-10 (Mir Iqbal Hussaion Trophy) to be held in Gurgaon from November 28. A total of 150 players have been spotted from the just-concluded inter-school tournament played between 80 teams and will be further shortlisted to a squad of 30 through selection trials at the same venue.

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