26-year-old Professional Footballer from Mumbai Collapses on the Field, Dies

Scott D’Souza, a 26-year-old professional footballer from Dadar, collapsed and died after he was rushed to a hospital.

Scott, who played as a defender for many Mumbai teams like PIFA Colaba, Union Bank, Air India and Karnataka Football Association, was playing a football game with his friends on artificial turf at a school ground and after a 45-minute session is when he started feeling uncomfortable and sat down beside the goal.

After he complained of breathlessness, his friends rushed him to PD Hinduja Hospital in Mahim, where he was declared brain-dead later in the evening.

“We immediately attended to him,” Scott’s friend Snedden Mendes told Mumbai Mirror.

“All he said was, ‘I don’t know what is happening to me.’ We made him sit up straight. All of a sudden, he started gasping for breath.”

“Why should somebody so young and fit go away like this,” Scott’s aunt Phiona Vaz, who is herself a hockey player, told TOI.

Scott’s friend recalled to Mumbai Mirror, that he “went to the Union Bank of India in 2017-18 as a striker and scored the highest goals in that season. Then, he joined Air India and played as a defender and striker. His last professional journey was with the Karnataka Sporting Association, where he captained the team and helped it secure the top spot in the MDFA Elite Division last year.”

He had won the MDFA Elite Division (Private) football league, leading the Karnataka Sporting Association team.

Scott’s father, Ozwald, had passed away in August at the age of 55. He had started the hockey club Ave Maria in the Mumbai.

Scott had also represented India in the F5WC in 2017, the largest amateur five-a-side football tournament, and as his friends said, ‘was a versatile player who switched from defence to a midfield role and had an eye for goal’.

“It is sad to know that he won’t play another match in his life. Can’t believe he is no more,” Julian D’Silva, his coach in Union Bank, told TOI.