Proud Moment for India As Shahzad Rafi and Abhinash Shanmugham Handpicked to Play in Neymar Jr’s Redbull Global Five Team

It is a proud moment for India as Shahzad and Abhinash have been shortlisted from over a million entries and made the cut from final 33,000 videos from all over the world.

New Delhi: Kerala Teenager, Shahzad Rafi and Bengaluru youngster, Abhinash Shanmugham have been handpicked as two of the seven freestyle footballers from India for the 2021 Red Bull Neymar Jr’s Global Five Team. The boys were selected through an online talent hunt that got entries from all over the world and now both of them will play alongside Brazilian and PSG superstar Neymar Jr’s team in a global five-a-side event to be held in Qatar. The Red Bull Neymar Jr’s Five is regarded as one of the largest amateur football tournaments in the world.

The other five footballers who’ll be competing are Jaimy Schallenbergh (Belgium), Simon Gustavo (Brazil), Leon Gillies Mannes (Norway), Giorgio Montalti (Italy), and Stanley Godian (Nigeria). They were all under the watchful eyes of the former Barcelona man, as he was part of the committee comprising of seven panellists that examined 60-second videos of footballing talent shared by interested candidates on the social media platform, Instagram.

It is a proud moment for India as Shahzad and Abhinash have been shortlisted from over a million entries and made the cut from the final 33,000 videos from all over the world.

Last year, Shahzad who hails from Kannur, applied for the Neymar Jr’s Global Five team but couldn’t get a chance. This year turned out to be different for the Cristiano Ronaldo fan as now he is excited to share the big stage with Neymar. He has also previously met one of the best freestyle footballers in the world, Sean Garnier.

The Neymar Jr’s Global Five 2021 team is organised by the energy drink giants Red Bull where the team will meet at Doha for the Finals, later this year and will take on other teams from all over the world in a 10-minute five-a-side tournament.