Sports minister urges AIFF to reschedule matches in afternoon

Kolkata: Two days after the power failure during Sunday`s high-voltage derby clash, West Bengal Sports minister Madan Mitra on Tuesday requested the All India Football Federation (AIFF) to reschedule I-League matches in the Yuba Bharati Krirangan in the afternoon.

The 1,20,000 capacity stadium, second largest in the world, plunged into darkness during the second half of the Mohun Bagan-East Bengal clash watched by more than 85,000 crowd. It took 18 minutes for power to be restored causing another embarrassment for the stadium owned by the state government. To avoid a repeat of such an incident, Mitra today requested AIFF and the hosts IFA to re-schedule all the matches in the stadium to afternoon till a permanent solution to the frequent power failure was found. "I`ve requested to shift the I-League matches to afternoon until we make the electricity arrangments foolproof in YBK," Mitra said after his meeting with AIFF and IFA. It is learnt that the timing of the Kolkata matches in YBK will be shifted to 2 pm, beginning with Wednesday’s seventh round match between United SC and Mohun Bagan. "We have set up an inquiry committee. We want to get into the root cause of the problem. The wiring and set up is about 30 years old. Everything has to be replaced." Mitra said they were in talks with a Singapore-based firm to redo the electrical set-up. PTI