Aizawl, May 2: The three foreigners of Aizawl FC Kamo Stephane, Kingsley Obumneme, and Alfred Jaryan are being called as 'The Three Musketeers' of the club.

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Kamo, who is originally from Ivory Coast, had started his career playing in Nigeria. Kingsley is from Nigeria and Alfred started his career in Liberia. All of them had played a major role in guiding their team to the maiden I-League crown.

But the interesting part of the story is that all these three footballers were practically jobless a season back! Still, Alfred was registered by Mohammedan Sporting against a paltry 15 thousand rupees monthly payment.

Kingsley, who had a great show at the Aizawl defence, had signed for Kolkata Premier League football Club Kalighat Milan Sangha. But he was not given game time.

Being frustrated after sitting on the bench throughout the Kolkata League, Kingsley began to take part in 'masala matches', being organised by different unauthorised private clubs and organisations all around the districts in West Bengal.

The organisers of these five-a-side or seven-a-side matches try to stage tournaments at the remote places so that the ruling body in state football, the Indian Football Association (IFA) as well as the premier clubs like East Bengal, Mohun Bagan do not come to know about these matches.

Kamo and Alfred also joined Kingsley taking part in the 'masala matches' to earn their bread and butter as they also were having a horrible time, watching their respective club matches from the reserve bench only.

Kamo had signed for Kolkata's another first division club George Telegraph. But he also was being deprived of getting a chance in the first eleven.

The Ivory Coast striker said: “I will not forget those days in Kolkata. I had to continue playing in 'masala matches' to survive.

"We used to receive (me, Kingsley and Alfred) around 1000 or 2000 rupees per match. We were in such financial distress that we could not avoid the offers.

"But at the same time, the mainstream football was not accepting us as we were being tagged 'masala match' players."

All these footballers gave credit to Aizawl FC coach Khalid Jamil for their rejuvenation as footballers.

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