It’s all happening way too fast for this 28-year-old footballer. Eugeneson Lyngdoh, a central midfielder from Shillong has just gone under the hammer at the Indian Super League (ISL) Players’ Auction in Mumbai. About 10 minutes into the bidding and the franchisees including Kerala Blasters, NorthEast United, Pune City FC and Delhi Dynamos were all warring to grab him. Lyngdoh just couldn’t take the pressure and closed his eyes. The next thing he knew, he had become the first footballer to breach the crore mark!

“Wait, did I just become a millionaire, what’s going on?” were the exact words he said when Pune City FC — co-owned by actor Hrithik Roshan — snatched him for a whopping Rs 1.05 crore to play in the second edition that kicks off on October 3.

“I had only heard about players’ auctions. But to be there was an amazing feeling,” says the footballer, who was one of the 10 players up for bidding. “None of us wanted to go first and when my name was called out, I was a wreck,” recalls Lyngdoh.

Renedy Singh, a former India player and assistant coach at Pune City FC, recounts how the battle for Lyngdoh got really intense. “We had to fight really hard to get him,” says Singh who played with Lyngdoh for over a year at Shillong Lajong FC (the first team from the Northeast to play in India’s professional football league — the I-League). “We were in dire need of a winger. Since he can play in all the three positions, both left and right wings and middle, he is a perfect fit. His box-to-box movements, his speed and technique are all very impressive.”

Lyngdoh has been around for few seasons, but everyone wants a slice of him. Despite his lack of experience, Stephen Constantine, the national coach, picked him for the 2018 World Cup pre-qualifier against Nepal this year in which Lyngdoh contributed to the 2-0 win. “Where was he all these days?” exclaims Constantine and adds: “He’s an asset for us in the midfield.”

Adjudged the Best Midfielder in I-League for 2014-15, Lyngdoh, like most kids in the Northeast, fell in love with the game as a child.

His father owns Ar-Hima (renamed Rangdajied), a professional football club that often participates in the
Second Division I-League, but the footballer was studying in a school where academics came first.

“I remember studying hard in Class 11 because if I had failed that would have meant a blanket ban on football by my parents,” says Lyngdoh who’s practicing in Shillong before joining Pune City in August. Later, he went to study electronics engineering at the Maharashtra Institute of Engineering, Pune, but dropped out halfway. “I flunked the exams as I was playing in various inter-college and university tournaments,” recalls Lyngdoh.

For, during his third year, his team Cedrick’s 8 had won the All-India Tournament in Hyderabad. “That gave us a chance to represent India at an international tournament at Old Trafford, the home of Manchester United. It coincided with my exams and I chose playing over studies,” he says.

By the end of the third year, Lyngdoh had failed most of his tests. “Going back to college was useless, so I headed back home,” he says. His parents tried every trick in the book to change his mind. “We were really disappointed as we wanted him to complete his studies,” says his mother, Switzerland Lyngdoh. “Initially his father didn’t even allow him to play for his own club but eventually gave in,” she says.

Once included in the side, Lyngdoh ably captained his club and led the team to win the local league for four consecutive years.

Life was about to change for this footballer as it was during one of those matches that Pradhyum Reddy, who was then the assistant coach with Shillong Lajong FC, spotted him. “What impressed me most was his intelligence. He knows when to make the right moves,” says Reddy. 

“I went to his father to talk to him,” reminisces Larsing Ming Sawyan, Shillong Lajong FC's owner. “He allowed him to play but with the rider that we were not allowed to pay him. It was only the next season that we contracted him for Rs 20 lakh to Rs 25 lakh a year,” he adds.

In 2014, Reddy, who became the assistant coach at Bengaluru FC, the reigning champion, persuaded Lyngdoh to sign a year’s deal with them that proved to be a milestone in his career. “Here, I learned a lot from big players like Sunil Chhetri and Robin Singh,” says Lyngdoh.

Despite all the attention, Lyngdoh has his feet firmly on the ground. “The ultimate goal is to play for India. That feeling — when you hear the national anthem while everyone in the stadium watches you — is unparalleled. I get goose bumps!”