Spartan qualify for Red Bull Neymar Jr’s Five National Finals

Dimapur, September 14 (MExN): Spartan FC has won the local qualifiers to represent Dimapur at the Red Bull Neymar Jr’s Five national (futsal) finals scheduled later this month. As per a press release, over 28 teams competed in the qualifiers, which kicked off at City Futsal, Orchid grounds, Dimapur on September 11. 

Spartan defeated Blitz FC 2-0 in the final. 

The qualifiers were held from August 21 till September 12 across 18 venues, including Indore, Ahmedabad, Jaipur, Bangalore, Lucknow, Pune, Kolkata, Chennai, Siliguri, Mumbai, Delhi, Hyderabad, Jalandhar, Dimapur, Bhubaneswar, Kochi, Chandigarh and Goa. It is the biggest 5-a-side football tournament in the country in-terms of locations & participants.

The winner at the national finals will make it to Red Bull Neymar Jr’s Five 2021 World Finals in Qatar. 

Red Bull Neymar Jr’s Five is the Brazilian star’s signature five-a-side tournament bringing players aged 16 to 35 from all corners of the world together to celebrate their shared passion: football. It is a fast, technical and fun competition which sees two teams of five players, sans a goalkeeper, have 10 minutes to strut their stuff and win a chance to impress Neymar Jr. The twist in this thrilling affair is that for each goal scored by a team, a member of the opposition will have to leave the field. The team with the maximum players takes the spoils.

Regarding the evolution of this global football tournament, Neymar Jr. commented, “It’s amazing. I remember as if it were today, when they showed me the proposal for the tournament, rules, boxed goals that brought me back to when I was a kid. The objective was transforming Red Bull Neymar Jr’s Five into a reference for football players whenever they think of 5-a-side games, and I think we’re on the right track. There have been more than 400,000 people over the last four years, dozens of countries in the qualifiers. It’s very cool to see more female teams and more women involved in the tournament, always at the highest level. And this is just the beginning of our journey.”

The tournament is based on the belief that footballers never earn their skills in big stadiums at big clubs. Their journey almost always begins on the streets, with their friends, like it did for Neymar Jr. In the streets, their main obstacles are not the opposing defenders but the hard gravel, sweltering heat and the blinding dust. Most legends started out on a mere, obstacle-filled street, but turned the mere street into a path.

Red Bull Neymar Jr’s Five 2019 India Champions, Kalina Rangers from Mumbai represented India at the World Finals in Brazil with a historic win against Hungary, who were eventually crowned winners of the tournament.

The release further informed that under the Jr’s Global Five consumer activation, one can show off their skills in a creative way, record them (best play – max 60 seconds), post them to Instagram (use hashtag #outplaythemall, tag @redbullneymarjr’sfive and add your country flag) and wow Neymar Jr and his scouts. They will select 6 players and 1 wild card entry to take part as the Jr’s Global Five at this year’s World Final.