NEW DELHI: German sportswear giant Adidas and Reliance Foundation Youth Sports to hold School and College Football competitions starting from 27 August 2016.

The two have signed multi-year deal for this purpose. In the first year, the competition will be played in eight cities in Guwahati, Kochi, Chennai, Delhi, Kolkata, Mumbai, Pune and Goa, featuring over 2000 teams and 40,000 youths playing football.

The RFYS Football competitions will be held across four categories - Junior, Senior and College boys and Senior Girls.

Aimed at creating a unified structure for school and college competitions across sports, Reliance wants to encourage a multi-discipline sports culture among schools and colleges and provide young athletes an integrated growth platform.

As the performance partner with RFYS, adidas will provide the official match balls for the programme and will also be the kit partner to all the City Champions qualifying for the National Finals.

adidas Senior Marketing Director Damyant Singh said, “India’s love for the sport of football has grown tremendously over the last decade. A crucial link that was missing was the existence of a unified School and College competition that would give young athletes the opportunity to showcase their skills against the best in India. RFYS will fundamentally change the way the next generation of Indians coach, train and compete. Grassroots is the bedrock on which sporting success is built and adidas is very proud to play its part in supporting the RFYS.”