As far as tall orders go, for Delhi to advance from their cluster in the Santosh Trophy can be compared to climbing a mountain during a galestorm.
After a dirty battle for power during the Delhi Soccer Association elections a month ago, the forthcoming national championship escaped everyone's attention - or, as usual, nobody bothered. Now that the opening match of their Santosh Trophy campaign is nearly upon Delhi as they face Jammu and Kashmir on Friday, the DSA officials and coach Anadi Barua are finally wide awake, ruing how time has flown past.
The team, though “honing” their skills for nearly a month during a training camp, came together only a couple of days ago when Sunil Chhetri and Parveen Rawat joined the camp.
Barua insists that the team is in fine fettle, ready for the "big war". However, this claim does not hold much water: Key striker and captain Chetri has joined the preparations at the last minute, and Rome was certainly not built in a day. Jammu and Kashmir though, will be no pushovers.