TARA HAS LEFT A LEGACY FOR CLUB FOOTBALL IN THE COUNTRY

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Tara’s legacy of turning a small club into giant killers will live on https://www.thestar.com.my/sport/football/2021/12/04/taras-legacy-of-turning-a-small-club-into-giant-killers-will-live-on#.Yaq0iays5O4.whatsapp


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 South City FC’s 50 years in existence and a grand dinner was held three years ago and Tara was honoured by their current managed led by president V. Sunderaj and secretary R. Sivakumar.

BY TONY MARIADASS

A football legend on his own rights, Tara Singh Pall Singh, who passed away on Oct 28 at the age of 74, has left behind memories of how he worked wonders with a small football club – South City FC – in Selangor, which will live forever.

 Tara was an example of what passion, dedication and sacrifices can even make a small unknown club like South City FC, become ‘giant killers’ and get noticed.

 Tara who worked with JKR Salak South since 1967, started his involvement with the ‘beautiful game’ playing for seven-a-side team – Red Devils – a ‘Village team’ where he stayed at the JKR quarters at Salak South.

 This team went to win many seven-a-side tournaments and it was in 1969 that Tara decided to change their team’s name to ‘South City FC’ and made its debut in the FA of Selangor Reserve league in 1976.

 Training at the community field at Salak South, Tara a goalkeeper, was a rare sight, as it was not common to see a Sikh boy play the goalkeeper position.

Goalkeeper Tara Singh standing second from left with South City

 He made his impact and helped his team win the Selangor Reserve league title in 1978 and earned promotion to Division 3.

 One year later South City won the Division 3 title and earned promotion to Division 2 where they played in the Division till 1981, when they won the title to move up to Division 1 in 1982 and Tara won all titles as a player with the team.

South City earned promotion to Selangor Premier League in 1982 which was the highest league at that point of time, before the Dunhill league was initiated in 1984.

Tara took a break from the game from 1982 till 1983 and return to manage South City as a manager from 1984, where South City emerged as the Premier league champion and promoted to Dunhill league in 1985, where they finish 5th from 12 team league.

It was in 1986 that South City stole the thunder and got noticed when they created history to qualify as Selangor’s representation to the FAM Cup – the national club tournament.

South City qualified for the 3rd round only to lose to RMR from Armed Forces.

Tara’s dedication to football was noticed by the football administrators of FA of Selangor and was offered a seat as a council member in FAS but he declined as wanted to focus on development of football in rural areas.

Among the players that were groomed by him include P. Somasundaram, Basil Johnny, R. Kannan, and R. Sivakumar to name a few.

Tara was a very outspoken in giving his views on football especially development of football in Selangor. Tara also easily stood out, as he spoke fluent Tamil and was hit among the Indian players at tournaments, when he used to give encouragement in Tamil.

Sadly, he did not have the means and support to implement development programmes the way he wanted.

Soon he realised that as a small club like South City, it was difficult to compete against the ‘big boys’ in the Klang Valley, where more and more banks, government agencies and corporate sectors started setting up football teams and used employment and money to lure the better players from small clubs like South City to join them.

 South City found the going tough with the drain of their top players to join bigger clubs and soon they were demoted to Selangor Premier league and kept dropping down season after season.

Today South City still exists but the current management see their team more involved in ‘social veterans’ matches and tournaments.

Three years ago, was South City FC’s 50 years in existence and a grand dinner was help and Tara was honoured by the current managed led by president V. Sunderaj and secretary R. Sivakumar.

In recent years before Tara passed away, he was regular at veteran tournaments to lend his support and his sons Kiranjit, who used to play for Public Bank, is the president of the veteran International Football Club (IFC) and Shiranjit who played KL Malay Mail in Premier II, now plays and is the convenor of the Kelab Aman Football team.

“We are going to miss him greatly. Our involvement in football is because of our father with whom we followed from his younger playing days. Later years he supported our involvement and was always there to lend his moral support,” said Kiranjit.

“Life is never going to be the same without our father. Football was his life, and it played a great part in our lives too. Him not being around is going to leave a huge vacuum in our lives,” said Shiranjit.

Tara leaves behind his wife, Manjit Kaur and another younger son, Sanjit.

 Tara may no longer be around, but his memories and legacy left behind will always be remembered and cherished.