Bhutan’s finest hour in football

Good times are on a roll, as far as Bhutanese football aspirations are in focus. The national team players’ display of their soccer skills to secure a comfortable 2-1 score in the recent matchup against Sri Lanka and a favorable overall 3-1 score in the Pre-World Cup 2018 qualifying round are indeed happy developments.

Needless to say, this is the finest hour for Bhutan as a footballing nation.

Seen as the lowest ranked nation in the FIFA ranking, the nation is time and again instantly reminded and cannot easily forget the 20 to nothing loss it excruciatingly experienced during a matchup against the Kuwaiti team not so many years ago.

As a smallest of the small nation persistently trying to stamp its mark on this world, this development really deserves all the fanfare and glory it is being given. By all counts, considering the magnitude at which this is a breakthrough for Bhutanese football dreams, a chance to make its place in the sun, even.

The positive development also signals a ray of sunshine for local football and its healthy growth.

Up and until this hour of international level achievement, hope remained rather on the dimmer side for any football enthusiastic Bhutanese youth to chart a career in the sport or for that matter in promoting the sport effectively as a local phenomenon.

Although the sport enjoyed popularity among Bhutanese both old and the young as a spectacle, local football clubs have only had more of players dividing their time between a ‘stable’ job and then their sporting object of passion – football.

Getting back to the celebratory national win, it is perhaps general thought among many that probability of a win over the other teams it will face is not hugely on the positive side. But merely piercing the shell to officially gain entry is a big deal for the country.

At the same time, it goes without saying that the Bhutanese team will put in every ounce of grit and determination toward every matchup they plunge into.

Perhaps this time around the sweat, the grind and the toil will bring in real opportunities for football enthusiastic youths. And that would be speaking in terms of seeing better facilities, better salaries for those investing their lives as football players.

So, in essence the first win in the World Cup qualifier is a win for everyone who has ever desired to see positive changes in the football scene. And yes of course, it is a victory for the nation as a whole.

Published as Editorial for Business Bhutan on March 21, 2015