Former India football goalkeeper Bandya Kakade, a member of the squad that won a bronze at the 1970 Asian Games in Bangkok, passed away in Mumbai, on Wednesday.
The 67-year-old former custodian breathed his last at around 4.30 pm following a sudden heart attack, his family said.
Kakade, born in Mumbai, donned the famous Tata SC colours for close to two decades barring a two-year gap and was a "good and stylish" goalkeeper, according to another former Tata and India custodian, S S (Babu) Narayan.
"He joined Tatas after I quit as a player in 1970. Earlier he was with Mafatlal and Railways. He was a stylish and good goalkeeper with acrobatic dives. He was part of the Indian bronze-medal winning team at the 1970 Asian Games," said Narayan.
This was the last medal won in football by India in the continental sports spectacle. Kakade was then understudy to Kuppuswami Sampath of MEG-Bangalore in the side led by Syed Nayeemuddin and coached by P K Banerjee.
Hailing from a family of tailors, Kakade showed little interest in studies as a boy in a Municipal school and was interested in football and tennis, often acting as the ball boy in the courts near his house.
Earning some money as a ball boy and also by selling soda and peanuts during matches at the Cooperage football ground near his house, Kakade earned his spurs as a budding player in 1960 with Friends XI, a local club in Mumbai.
He joined the Central Railway a year later and there his career as a goalkeeper blossomed till he joined Mafatlal SC, a top Mumbai football club, in 1966.
Four years later, he fulfilled his ambition of joining the Tatas and the same year he represented the country in the Asian Games.
He retired from Tatas in 1989 at the age of 44.
He was feted by the Maharashtra government for his contribution with the state's highest award for sports, Shiv Chhatrapati Award, in 1975-76.
