CHENNAI: Taking to sports from the age of two-and-a-half, it is no wonder that Adhithi Rajagopal is one of the youngest rising football players in the country. Playing for the Chennai, Tamil Nadu and India football teams under various age categories, she has also captained the Amma FC, a Manipur based-football club in the International Youth Soccer Tournament, DANA CUP held at Denmark in the last two years. The Chennai ponnu recently received the Pothys Young Achievers Award and she shares her journey with CE.
Adhithi started with gymnastics and athletics, but took up football in Class six when her school coach, Kalidasan, started a girls’ football team. “I was the youngest team member then as the others were at least in Class eight,” she recalls. “He is my godfather...He made me believe in myself.”In the beginning, she admits she was not very interested in football. “I was never able to understand the tactics of the game. I didn’t take special efforts to understand the game either,” she recalls.
Once her team started going for tournaments and winning, she started setting up small goals for herself, the first one being getting ‘Best player of the tournament’, which she did the very same year. Adithi is known for her expertise in ‘free kicks’. She enabled her team to qualify for the finals in a tournament held in 2015 through winning an almost drawed match with her free kick!
Managing school and captaining a football team is no mean feat, and Adhithi recalls the times when she was in Class 10, and had to attend the Indian camp for three months, missing all her lessons. “My principal and friends helped me pass my boards!” she says.
The journey of a woman football player in a conservative society is definitely a challenge, she points out. “When playing with boys, I have noticed they will have second thoughts about passing the ball to you even if you have a better chance of scoring,” she says.
Adhithi also recalls another incident while playing with her brother in a local ground, when an uncle said, saying ‘a girl wearing shorts and playing football’. “He definitely didn’t mean it in a good way. And that was very weird,” she laughs.
Adithi is pursuing an undergraduate degree in Sports Management at the Cardiff Metropolitan University, Wales. “I wanted to go professional in football, but in India, women’s football does not have much scope. The growth is very slow here,” she rues. “Countries abroad have better infrastructure and players have better physique. I’m doing weightlifting training to build muscles.”
Receiving the Young Achievers Award has motivated her to pursue her dream, which is to come back to India and get selected for the senior Nationals team. “I also want to play for the Chelsea Womens FC one day,” she smiles.