Oxigen concludes First Doon Cup with ANDRO Club & Doon School as Venue partner

A World Class Football program also marking development of School Girls Football

New Delhi: Standing tall on its commitment towards sports, Oxigen announces the launch of an inspiring sports platform to promote football for Indian girls titled ‘Doon Cup’. The tournament is in its maiden endeavor in creating a world class football platform in association with ANDRO Club and the Doon School as their host and venue partners, to begin with. The objective of this platform is to replicate The ‘Dana Cup’ format at a micro level to startup and provide an opportunity to school girls to participate in football competition at “Dana Cup”. Denmark’s Dana Cup is the largest International Youth Football tournament in the world.

Elucidating further on the announcement, Mr. Rajpal Duggal, Oxigen Services commented, “Oxigen took the lead in promoting football for school girls with sponsoring an All-Girls school tournament in Manipur in October 2015 where over 100 girls participated. Continuing the effort, we now came forward to support the Oxigen Doon Cup where over 18 teams participated in the tournament. Oxigen believes that that there is a need to promote sports among girls and the best way to get started is at the school level. India is way behind in competitive football for Women and Oxigen is very happy to support any effort that will lead us to having an international presence in the next few years. Partnering with ANDRO Club, a platform that promotes football for girls we will support a 12-member team that will participate in the DANA Cup in Denmark in July 2016. This international exposure in the DANA cup tournament will do a world of good to the participants.”

The tournament is backed by three experts in the football landscape, Pepe Dugal, A Doon School alumni, MD of Dugal Consultancy Services and the President of the Indo-Canadian Cancer Research Foundation; Aashish Khanna is an ardent football fanatic, a player in the Senior Amateurs Club Team in Switzerland and Bikram Singh Thockchom, a TCS employee, an International Coerver Coach, who has been involved in girls football for a number of years and runs The Soccer Foundation and is also linked to the Dana Cup. These veterans add to the profundity of the platform through their knowledge and experience in the field of football.

Bikram Singh Thockchom added, “It is indeed a profound initiative by Oxigen and Doon School. Being a part of girl’s football for years now, I believe that a platform and an opportunity of this level were certainly required. After understanding the growth map planned by Oxigen, which goes as far as 2018, it is definite that the company along with its associates will bring out the best in the girls, while it walks along with them for some time on the path of learning and success”.

The first edition of the “Doon Cup” was concluded last weekend where 18 teams from different schools participated. Oxigen was the Title sponsor of the event. The Oxigen Doon Cup sets an example of how talent at micro level can be identified and be given an opportunity to showcase and participate at world level.

The Doon Cup will be an annual event and Oxigen has earlier promoted a tournament in Manipur in October 2015 and will also host a tournament in May 2016. It is intended that from the Oxigen Doon Cup & Oxigen Imphal Cup tournaments, a selected team of 12 players will be selected and sponsored by Oxigen to participate in the Dana Cup in Denmark in July 2016.

The intent behind this association was also to recreate the excitement of the historical Doon Valley Football Tournament hosted during the British Raj and bring back the glory of the past to the valley. Corresponding to these thoughts, Oxigen believes that partnering with renowned schools, is a great approach. Initially, the platform will be utilizing the Doon School and its facilities and further take on additional facilities in other schools as the plan and the platform heads towards an upward growth trajectory. It intends on building the platform in a gala event with over 5,000 participants by the year 2018. Oxigen’s association with football started back in the year 2015 with its sponsorship in the Sachin Tendulkar owned Kerala Blasters Football Club for the Indian Super League.