As per a press release by Odisha FC, The CII Beach Soccer 2021, the first of its kind beach soccer festival in Odisha will take place at Chandrabhaga Beach, Konark on 22nd and 23rd February. The event will be organised by Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) in association with Department of Tourism, Government of Odisha, alongwith the Odisha Football Club (OFC) being the Technical Partner of the event. The football festival is an attempt to amalgamate football and the stunning coastline of Konark. The event will feature ten teams – Jindal Steel and Power, Nalco, Tata Steel, Gupta Power, Indian Oil, CSM, Paradeep Phosphates Limited, Paradeep Port Trust, GRIDCO and Capgemini competing in 12 minute matches each with 3 minutes break. The final match will be played on 23 February at 6:30 pm. Also, there will be two exhibition matches that will be contested between CII and the Women’s team on the final day. Vishal Dev, IAS, Secretary, Department of Tourism, Government of Odisha said, “I strongly believe that this will go a long way to achieve dual goals of promoting Odisha tourism as well as sports to a global audience.” Mr Rajiv Kumar, Vice President & Head Operations, KPO Project, Tata Steel Ltd, Chairman, Odisha State Council added, “Beach soccer has always been a winning combination of football, carnival-like crowd atmosphere and sheer spectacle. The CII two-day Beach Soccer initiative will embrace aspects normally associated with the beach, like family, recreation, youth culture, fitness and vitality. I wish the event a grand success.” Suvam Das, Grassroots Manager, Odisha FC said, “We are extremely delighted to be a part of this unique event which brings together the beauty of Odisha’s coastline and the beautiful game of soccer. Our club is dedicated towards any such program which promotes football and we are thankful to CII and Odisha Tourism for this lovely initiative.”