Ancheri named for Arjuna Award

The All India Football Federation has again proposed the name of Jo Paul Ancheri for the Arjuna Award after the versatile player missed out on the prestigious honour last year.

"We have recommended Ancheri's name for this year's award, but we have not recommended any name for the Dronacharya Award," AIFF general secretary Alberto Colaco said.

If chosen Ancheri will be the 21st footballer to win the honour. Ancheri's close friend I M Vijayan was the last footballer to bag the honour, in 2002.

The 29-year-old Ancheri, who twice won the AIFF 'Player-of-the-year' award, in 1994 and 2001, is currently recuperating in Kerala following knee surgery.

His exclusion together with that of high jumper Bobby Aloysius from last year's list of Arjuna award winners saw sportspersons, officials, coaches and enthusiasts staging protests in Thiruvananthapuram.

List of footballers who won Arjuna Award:

1. 1961: P K Banerjee - Bengal
2. 1962: T Balaram - Bengal
3. 1963: Subimal (Chuni) Goswami - Bengal
4. 1964: Jarnail Singh - Bengal
5. 1965: Arun Lal Ghosh - Railways
6. 1966: Yousuf Khan - Andhra
7. 1967: Peter Thangraj - Bengal
8. 1969: Inder Singh - Punjab
9. 1970: Syed Nayeemuddin - Bengal
10. 1971: Chandreshwar Prasad - Bengal
11. 1974: Magan Singh - Rajasthan
12. 1978: Gurdev Singh - Punjab
13. 1979: Prasun Banerjee - Bengal
14. 1980: Mohammed Habib - Bengal
15. 1982: Sudhir Karmakar - Bengal
16. 1991: Subroto Bhattarcharya - Bengal
17. 1997: Brahmanand Shankhwalkar - Goa
18. 1998: Baichung Bhutia - Bengal
19. 2000: Bruno Coutinho - Goa
20. 2002: I M Vijayan - Kerala.