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Remembering football's little master
Tucked away among the tight cluster of low buildings, it's a tiny patch of green. Pragati Sangha's football field is no bigger than a basketball court, and its cramped confines have always frowned upon the expansive manoeuvres and, instead, compelled players onto a path of precision passing and close ball-control.
It's just as well. When Krishanu Dey burst onto the bigger stage, there was in his beautiful game a little something
from that tiny patch of green on which he had spent hours and hours as a kid.
But, then, Krishanu was not just about ball control and other highly honed football skills. There was vision, beauty and joy as well, and all these he brought in abundance to the pitch, as if in joyous celebration of the game itself. A celebration that everyone became part of. The colour of his jersey was rendered irrelevant as fans rose above club allegiance to savour his magical touches and creativity.
No one owned Krishanu. He belonged to
everybody.
Operating from just left of centre, from behind the front row, his shrewd gamemaking was about wickedly curling crosses, perfectly weighted chips and telling 'throughs'.
Sharp peripheral vision meant well-placed teammates were picked up without so much as a glance even as his alert football brain quickly weighed the options. His impeccable skills would ensure that delivery was prompt and precise.
Scurrying teammates found the ball nestle nicely into their path, just out of reach of opposing players. Defence splitting passes discovered paths that didn't seem to exist till he showed they were there.
And all this with a lazy grace that made football look ridiculously easy, even in the heat of top-level competition.
But, then, it could never have been easy for Krishanu. His game, after all, was like a work of art - delicate and easily ruined by one careless stroke of the brush. In his tight, high-skilled show, the margin of error was tiny and there was,
thus, the need to retain sharpness. It came with hours and hours of work with the ball.
'Rantu', as he was called by friends and family, was a shy, soft-spoken man not given to any public show of emotion. His simplicity even had a streak of vulnerability in the early years of his career, prompting several teammates to assume a protective role off the pitch.
This demureness and the touch play may have lulled many into believing that Krishanu was a 'softie' on the pitch. Those that had played with or against him know how far that is from the truth.
While 'detached' creativity is what Krishanu seemingly indulged in for most part of a match, the bow-legged genius loved to get into the thick of things and was as stubborn as they get when it came to ball possession, refusing to part with it even as opponents tugged at his shirt, elbowed his small frame or had him felled to the turf. His determination showed also when he sniffed a goal and dashed in for the kill, the short
stature never a hindrance as he held his own amidst the jostling. It's no surprise, therefore, that Krishanu should score some very important goals himself, and few efforts stand out the way the hattrick at the 1986 Merdeka meet does.
The emotions too have spilled out at times. As it did when 'PK' had him start on the bench during an East Bengal-Mohun Bagan match. Angry and hurt, Krishanu took it out on the pitch when he came on as a second-half substitute, mesmerising Mohun Bagan and scoring the only goal of the match.
He hated to be left out, driven always by the gnawing urge to excel and entertain. All he needed to unleash his magic was a tiny patch of green.
appeared in Times of India on March 20, 2004
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