Bengaluru to host South Zone round of Santosh Trophy

Bengaluru, October 24: Garden City Bengaluru will host the South Zone qualifying round of the Santosh Trophy in the first week of January 2018, mykhel.com can confirm.

"We have received the go-ahead from the All India Football Federation already," Karnataka State Football Association's treasurer AD Nagendra, said on Tuesday (October 24). "It will be a huge thing for Bengaluru and us to host this prestigious tournament. This is all part of our president NA Haris's plans to promote the game in the state." Haris took over as acting KSFA president last year following the ill health of long-time president AR Khaleel.

Bengaluru have never hosted any zonal leg of the tournament, which was launched in 2014. Under this system, the five southern states and Puducherry or Andaman and Nicobar Islands play a league-cum-knockout tournament. The finalists qualify for the final round.

Before the zonal structure, Karnataka hosted the tournament way back in 1968-69, when the state played as Mysore. Playing as Karnataka, the state's best finish came in the 1975-76 Santosh Trophy, where they lost to West Bengal in the final. As Mysore, the state has won the tournament four times.

Over the recent years, there are not many takers for the hosting rights of the zonal rounds. Calicut (Kozhikode) hosted the South Zone leg in Jan this year while Chennai hosted it in 2014 and 2016. Manjeri played host to the zonal round in 2015.

The Santosh Trophy, one of India's oldest football tournaments, is contested among states and government units. This will be the 72nd edition of the event.