Where football became folklore: A Kerala village's century-long love affair with the beautiful game

In Kasaragod's coastal village of Mogral, football has its own beats, its own ballads. For more than a century, generations of families have gathered every evening on the same football ground to play, watch and cheer. The boys playing here today are rarely the first footballers in their families. Their fathers played on this ground. Before them, their grandfathers did too. Along the way, local Mappila poets composed ballads celebrating footballers, clubs and famous victories, turning the beautiful game into folklore.

This is the story of the 108-year-old Mogral Sports Club, the beedi worker who devoted his life to bringing village children to the ground, the legend of football's arrival from Russia, the music and the folklore that have grown around the game.