Shillong, May 2: Shillong Lajong FC defender Daniel Goncalves has been named as the winner of the Jarnail Singh Award for Best Defender of the I-League 2024-25 season.
This was announced on the I-League’s social media handles yesterday.
A regular since he joined the Shillong-based club for 2023-24, the Brazilian played 20 of 22 matches this season to go along with his 24 appearances (out of 24 games) last year. Dangerous in set-pieces, he also scored four I-League goals in 2024-25, equalling his tally from the previous campaign.
However, SLFC didn’t have the best of times defensively this year, conceding 45 goals, which is second-highest among the clubs in 2024-25 and their second-worst performance in any previous I-League campaign; Lajong’s record was in 2018-19, the year they were relegated, when the Reds conceded 56.
The Best Player and Golden Boot winner was David Castaneda of Sreenidi Deccan. He scored 17 goals in all, four more than Lajong’s Douglas Tardin, who finished second in the race for the top scorer award.
The winner of the Syed Abdul Rahim Award for Best Coach went to Dimitris Dimitrou of Churchill Brothers, with one of his players, Pape Gassama, named Best Midfielder. The Best Goalkeeper was Jaspreet Singh of Namdhari FC, while the Best Emerging Player gong went to Hridaya Jain of Delhi FC.
Three team awardees were also announced – Dempo SC (for Fair Play), Gokulam Kerala FC (Best Match Organisation) and Rajasthan United FC (Best Media Activities).
Although the league ended last month, there is still no clarity about who are the champions. After confirming Churchill Brothers as the victors on 19th April the All India Football Federation was instructed by the Court of Arbitration for Sport not to make a formal presentation until it hears an appeal from Inter Kashi over a disputed match that could decide the title in their favour. However, the AIFF claimed not to have received the CAS directive until after it handed over the trophy to Churchill Brothers on 26th April.
The award for worst league organisers thus goes to…?
(Photo: Shillong Lajong/Facebook)
