Hyderabad: Indian footballers, who were nominated for the 2007 Arjuna Award today expressed disappointment at being ignored for the prestigious award and said they would have been happy had at least one of them were selected. Renedy Singh, Mahesh Gawli, Deepak Mondal and Climax Lawrence were nominated by the All India Football Federation (AIFF) but none were selected despite the India winning the Nehru Cup last year, which was the country's first major international title in decades.
This meant that no footballer has been considered for the award for the fifth consecutive year after I M Vijayan received it in 2003. "I am disappointed that football did not get its credit. We were having high hopes that at least one of us will get the award. We won the Nehru Cup tournament, an international title after a long time but football has not been given credit.
I don't know why they (the committee) do not want to give the award to a footballer," midfielder Climax Pawrence said. Injured defender Deepak Mondal said he was disappointed at the step-motherly treatment meted out to footballers but said they could not do anything. (PTI)
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