Teardrop Titans
by Seth Burkett
July 2024
As England hang on by their fingernails at Euro 2024, Seth Burkett looks back at a rather different type of international football: his season as a pro footballer in Sri Lanka.
Priyan believes we’ll win easily. He assures us that Mannar, our opponents, are “no problem.” He knows their players and knows that we are better.
The only team we—the Trinco Titans: one of six teams in the 2019 North Eastern Premier League—may have an issue with is Valvai, he tells us, who we play after this. They’ve invested lots of money, have four national-team players and possess a powerful influence over officials. But that’s fine. We can still beat them and win the whole tournament. I appreciate his optimism, but want to wait and see the standard before deciding whether to believe him or not.
We eat Rimzy’s specially prepared food at midday, and arrive bang on time. The nerves are clear. Coach Thaabit Ahmed refuses food, too nauseous to get anything down. The players who meet us at the ground are like nervous balls of energy, bouncing all over the place. They’ve done a good job, though. The lines have all been painted, the nets and corner flags are up, and giant posters of me and Dean Curran—the two permitted foreign players in the Titans’ outfit—have been hung from the stands.
The changing room has also been decorated. Thaabit allows all players three minutes there to take as many selfies as they want, then insists they put their phones away until the game has finished. Ask a Sri Lankan to take a selfie and they aren’t likely to refuse. It feels like a fashion shoot. Each player has their own chair with their kit immaculately laid out and a sticker of their face plastered on the wall above. On one wall is a poster of the league table from last season, which Thaabit has printed to try and motivate the squad.
Mannar FC, I note, lost just one of their eleven games in 2018, conceding only eleven goals. Trinco, meanwhile, conceded forty-four and lost seven. And that was despite having two highly paid Nigerian professionals in the team. Already I’m sceptical of Priyan’s words.
We’re left to get changed. Players strap their knocks, stare at the league table, wait for the toilet to become free, slip in their shinpads, tighten their laces, breathe deeply, focus. Then, all of a sudden, Thaabit rushes in: “Go! Go! Go! All or nothing for Trinco!!” It’s like an army drill and he’s the sergeant: excited, nervous, impatient.
“These boys need to calm down,” Dean notes. He’s not wrong.
On the other side of the pitch, Mannar are also going about their work. I note their soft touches of the ball, their confident control, and know we’re going to be in for a tough match. They’re tall, too. Not like the Sri Lankans I’ve met so far.
In the tunnel I get a closer look. When Mannar finally arrive, that is—because Thaabit sends us out at 3:20pm. We stand around and wait, bored, though it helps any teammates’ excessive levels of adrenalin to settle. Our opponents provide a bit of interest. Many of them stare at me and point in my direction. I don’t know what they’re saying. At least three are taller than me and also more built. It looks like there’s going to be a serious imbalance at set-pieces.
The two teams remain in the tunnel. We wait, but I don’t know what for. The scheduled kick-off time of 3:30pm. comes and goes. So does 3:45pm.
We chat among ourselves. Sakhti goes one further. Nobody in Sri Lanka, it seems, is aware of the age-old trick where you tap someone on the chest, then move your hand up to slap their face when they look down. I’ve done it repeatedly to all my teammates and now Sakhti has picked on the tallest, biggest opponent and told him there’s something on his chest. He looks down and Sakhti slaps him. We go wild: 1-0 to Trinco.
Almost half an hour late, the game starts. And then it really is 1-0. Within three minutes Sakhti robs the ball from an opponent and squares it to Dean, who plays in Aflal for a one-on-one. He makes no mistake.
My whole body tingles. It’s strange. Usually when my team scores I stay calm, fully aware of the vulnerability of a lead. Yet now I’m charging towards Aflal with my arms open wide and screaming. Football, eh?
The crowd shrieks and whistles. About two hundred people are in the stands and on the touchline with several armed policemen watching over them. Chinna is one of those on the touchline. He’s come with a group of former players, many of whom are hoping to see us lose today.
“I receive more than 200 Friend requests on Facebook, all from Sri Lankans. The community has been galvanised.”
“Good luck,” one had told coach Rimzy before the game. “With players like Banda, you have no chance of winning.”
Mannar FC don’t panic. They stick to their game plan of passing it out from the back and through midfield – which is commendable given that the terrible pitch has been swept and watered to limit the dust kicked up from players’ boots, but appears to have acquired more stones and less padding from sand as a result.
We do the opposite. I try and kick long, but can’t get my foot under the ball on the hard, uneven surface. It plays with my mind. Meanwhile, Ranoos in goal launches his drop-kicks as high as possible, fully aware that it isn’t only hard to deal with but is also the best chance of creating a funny bounce that could lead to a goal.
We kick high, Mannar pass short. We play ugly, Mannar play beautifully. They’re a good team: that much is clear. The equaliser is inevitable, if not questionable. A little dink aimed between Jai and Vithu on the right side of defence sets their striker free. He lobs the ball over Ranoos but it hits the bar. I’m waiting for the rebound when the other striker careers into me, sending me flying. A sharp twinge spreads through my knee with pain running all the way down to my ankle. I hit the ground and am vaguely aware of my surroundings: shouts of offside, footsteps, more kicks then, eventually, the ball in the back of the net. Then the referee is next to me. I hear the calls of ‘offside, offside’. He sends for our physio, Mathu, who hits me with some magic spray. I limp to the side as the game restarts, unsure what’s just happened. (It isn’t until half-time I find out the goal was allowed.)
But still there’s time for one more before the break.
Mannar dominate the play with wave after wave of attack. I give away a silly free-kick, trying to reach my right leg around the striker to clear the ball he’s shielding. From the resulting free-kick another ball is clipped between Jai and Vithu, who play for offside. I desperately chase after the striker. I’m gaining on him. He’s slowing, taking a touch, then another, then another. On this surface, nothing but full certainty will do. I’m within a metre of him. I could slide but don’t think it’s safe enough. Too late. He’s let fire. The striker is no more than twelve yards out. For some reason, Ranoos is planted to his line, giving the striker plenty of the goal to aim at. Instead, the ball arcs through the air and straight into Ranoos’s gloves. But then it’s straight out of his gloves and into the path of the other striker, who taps it in. He’s at least five yards offside but no amount of protest will change the linesman’s decision. The goal stands.
Thaabit remains calm at half-time. He must have used up all his nerves in the first three quarters of an hour. He tells the boys they’re playing well, and to keep going.
Keep going they do. We control the second half. Our opponents continue to try and play out from the back, but they rarely breach our re-energised defence.
By now the crowd has swelled to at least 500. News has spread. They’re standing in the shade behind the goal, hugging the touchline and cheering in the stand. When we get the ball in an advanced position they go wild. I even get delirious cheers when I kick the ball out of play to concede a throw-in from a dangerous attack.
I’ve never played in front of such an excitable crowd. So when Banda taps home to make it 2-2 it’s no surprise that they go crazy. And when he lashes home an unstoppable thirty-yarder to put us into the lead, everyone loses it. The ball hits the net and he’s running and running and the fans are on the pitch and chasing him and he jumps into Thaabit’s arms. The squad catches him and we’re all together, laughing and smiling and high-fiving.
We don’t deserve the win. But none of that matters when the final whistle blows. Priyan collapses to the floor in joy. Just twenty-four hours earlier he’d told me it was “impossible” that Banda would score. The linesmen sprint to join the referee in the middle. And the crowd sprints to us. I’m being hugged from all angles, grown men are kissing my forehead and my hands. It’s pure madness. Someone lifts me up.
“The best player,” they say. “Amazing.”
“Very good header,” say others.
They really are getting carried away. I spot my most elderly friend, a former postman in his late seventies who supports us at our every training session at the stadium, running laps around the perimeter while we work and then joining in with the kids’ game in the corner. Every time we see each other we hug, but this time he runs up to me and I lift him up and spin him round and round. It seems everyone cheers that special moment. I’ve never known such a buzz.
It takes several minutes to break through the crowd and get to the dressing room, but almost immediately we’re shepherded back out for the presentation. A novelty-sized cheque for 25,000 rupees greets us, along with a 5,000 rupees one for the Man of the Match. Who else? It’s Banda.
The next day, Dean and I are walking down the road to the shop when a teenage boy cycles past. He slows and shouts: “Hey!” He motions kicking with his foot and says “very good!” before speeding off. He’s not the only person to recognise us after yesterday. I receive more than 200 Friend requests on Facebook, all from Sri Lankans.
The community has been galvanised. The Trinco Titans are putting Trincomalee back on the map. We’re representing the town, the region, proving its superiority to Jaffna. Trincomalee always used to be the best region at football, we’re told. It was a great source of pride. With North-East politics forever confused by the North and East factions of the Tamil Tigers splitting in 2005, the formation of the Karuna party from eastern Tigers that then joined forces with the government and attacked the remaining Tamil Tigers, the subsequent acts of violence, and the inability to display true political leaning, sport has become a post-war vehicle for identity. A proof of superiority in a region plagued by inferiority to the Sinhalese, yet also to the Tamil capital in Jaffna.
Despite all of the positivity around us, in our house a sense of reality has struck. Mannar, it emerges, lost their four best players to Valvai. In addition to that, we learn, the referee from the game has a complicated history with Trincomalee. Last time he refereed at this ground he was physically assaulted by members of the crowd. Hard to imagine that was not on his mind when he denied our opponents two stonewall penalties, much to the delight of all those in attendance.
No doubt, success in this North Eastern Premier League will rely on our vociferous and quite intimidating home supporters.
Seth Burkett’s Titans of the Teardrop Isle: A Season as a Pro Footballer in Sri Lanka is available now, from Floodlit Dreams.
