Rush in Mumbai: Picture Special
Liverpool legend Ian Rush today arrived in India to participate in a special three-day LFC - Standard Chartered Football Clinic taking place in Mumbai.
The club's record goalscorer has been ever present at all of the LFC - Standard Chartered Football Clinics so far - lending his vast experience in the game to the coaches training kids in Nairobi, East London and Seoul - and his arrival here in Mumbai has attracted much fanfare with 15 television crews vying for places at the Western Railway Ground in the Lower Parel area of Mumbai.
"It's fantastic to be here," Rush told Liverpoolfc.tv. "I'm really looking forward to seeing the kids from the Go Forward project in action as I've heard a lot about how they've come through their trials to make it through to the final stage. It will be good to see how they compare to the kids back home in terms of their ability. India isn't famous for football - everything is cricket, cricket, cricket - but I know there's a great desire here to change that and establish football as a major sport in this country.
"If Liverpool Football Club can play even a small part in that process of helping grow football in India then this clinic and our involvement in the Go Forward project will have been worthwhile."
While Rush only flew into Mumbai in the early hours of this morning, a delegation of the club's community coaches, two female members of Liverpool's own Goals 4 Girls project and staff from the LFC's media operation have been in the country since Tuesday, interacting with Standard Chartered's all-girl GOALS programme - a community initiative using netball to build self-esteem and teach them about sexual health amongst other social issues - as well as learning about Indian culture, meeting members of the Mumbai Official Supporters Club and visiting the slums of Mumbai to meet two of the kids who have made it through to the final 40 kids on the Go Forward project.
Stay tuned to the website later this week to read the full story of Montesh Bankar and Lucky Sandhu, two Mumbai slum children with dreams of one day playing for Liverpool FC.
