before coming to kolkata pele had scored in china and japan the brazilian legend took a lot of time to place the ball and concentrated hard before taking the shot a few seconds before pele took his shot my fathers advice rang in my ears dont reach for the ball we had our wall at the first post while i took up my position t at the second there appeared to be a rhythm to everything he did on match day the red road there was a big traffic jam and the players had a tough time getting to the eden gardens our boys played extraordinary football that day i probably made five or six t good saves in the game pele had this special ability to make the ball appear to stop in midair before suddenly gathering speed on way to hitting the target our supporters were quite unhappy he reminded me that if cosmos get a freekick pele will surely take it and the whole world including mohun bagan supporters will be hoping for the legend to score we had started preparing for the ifa shield with an eye on a final against east bengal tony field crossed into the box which pele brilliantly trapped with his chest controlled it with his thigh and just as he was going to volley i threw myself at his feet and pouched it pele was still in the air and his boot just inches from my face quite out of the blue we were informed by club secretary dhiren dey that mohun bagan will play an exhibition match against peles new york cosmos and we need to be ready in two weeks time we were excited about the fact that we were going to play against peles team then all of a sudden it appeared to stop and hang in the air sibaji banerjee is a former mohun bagan goalkeeper luckily i managed to keep it under control as told to abhishek ganguly pele swung the ball around the wall but the two saves that are still etched in my memory involved pele the mohun bagancosmos match in 1977 was an extraordinary event for all of us when pele takes the freekick father advised me dont reach for the ball rather wait for it mohun bagan were going through a lean patch on the day of the match before leaving home my father late it is not easy for a goalkeeper to dive in front but i had no time to think and just went for the ball i checked myself in time and dived full length and managed to clutch the ball which had propelled forward spinning viciously coach pk banerjee had trained us to defend setpieces but i knew very well that peles freekicks would be a different ball game we started following cosmos tour of asia cosmos got a freekick and pele stepped up to take it they say you are lucky if you get to see god