Red Card

Rishabh Bala is starting the tenth standard, and nothing is simple anymore. The board exams loom over every lesson, and he has fallen head over heels for someone, with all the awkwardness that comes with being a teenage boy. Through all of it, the thing he wants most is a trophy, just one, for his school football team.

The story is set in suburban Thane in 2006 and follows Rishabh and his friends as they move from restless classrooms and weary tuition sessions to the muddy football ground, where wins and losses both come hard. It is a coming-of-age novel that feels familiar and still has its own character, tracing a group of boys from the heart of puberty to the edge of adulthood.