Wikipedia - Santosh Trophy

The National Football Championship for Santosh Trophy, due to ties with FIFA (from 2024–25), also known as the FIFA Santosh Trophy, or simply Santosh Trophy, is an inter-state national football competition contested by the state associations and government institutions under the All India Football Federation (AIFF), the sport's governing body in India. Before the launch of the first national club league, the National Football League in 1996, the Santosh Trophy was considered the top domestic tournament in India. Many players who have represented India internationally have played and gained honour while playing in the Santosh Trophy. The tournament is held every year with eligible teams who are divided into zones, must play in the qualifying round and can progress into the tournament proper. The current champions are Karnataka, who won their title after 54 years during the 2022–23 edition. This was the first trophy for Karnataka, which had previously won four times as the princely state of Mysore, after 1968-69.

The tournament was started in 1941 by the Indian Football Association (IFA), which was the then de facto governing body of football in India. It was named after the former president of the IFA, Sir Manmatha Nath Roy Chowdhury, the Maharaja of Santosh who had died aged 61 in 1939. The IFA later donated the Santosh Trophy to the AIFF, soon after its formation as the sport's official governing body in India, and since then AIFF has been organising the tournament. The trophy for the runner-up, Kamala Gupta Trophy, was also donated by the then president of IFA, Dr. S.K. Gupta, and it was named in honour of his wife. The third-place trophy, Sampangi Cup, was donated by the Karnataka State Football Association (then Mysore Football Association) and was named so in the memory of a renowned footballer, Sampangi, who was from Mysore. Until 2018, the tournament was organised as an individual competition, but since 2021, the AIFF rebranded it as the men's senior tier of National Football Championship for the regional teams of various age groups. In September 2022, it was announced that the tournament will be organized on zonal basis.

印度桑托什杯足球联赛是由印度足球协会主办,以印度南部喀拉拉邦为中心的区域性职业足球联赛。联赛前身是成立于1949年的喀拉拉邦超级联赛,2005年印度足球协会决定将联赛升级为全国性赛事,并更名为桑托什杯。

该联赛的名称来源于喀拉拉邦的一名著名足球运动员桑托什·科塔,他于2015年去世,是印度足球的传奇人物。桑托什杯的目标是成为印度足球的顶级联赛之一,吸引更多的赞助商和观众,同时提高印度足球的整体水平。

该联赛分为两个赛区,每个赛区有10支球队,每个赛区的前三名将参加季后赛,争夺联赛冠军的殊荣。与其他职业联赛一样,桑托什杯也有升降级制度,如果球队在联赛中的表现不佳,可能会被降级到更低级别的联赛。

作为印度足球的一部分,桑托什杯也面临着一些挑战和问题,包括印度足球的整体水平较低、缺乏资金和资源、球员培养和青训体系不完善等。但是,随着印度足球的发展和投资的不断增加,桑托什杯和其他职业联赛也在不断改进和提升,为印度足球的未来发展注入新的活力。