Chelsea Fan Corner: Jigar Mistry

The COVID-19 pandemic hit the world in an unprecedented manner and humanity as a whole had to take a step back and gather its bearings before launching a fightback. But as time has dragged on, we are glad to replace the fear that the pandemic brought along with fresh hope and that's, in great part, thanks to the heroes who've led this battle.

Jigar Mistry is one such hero. An Indian doctor who led the battle from the frontlines, saving lives and tending to the patients while putting himself at risk.

A hardcore Chelsea supporter, Jigar Mistry has been playing the beautiful game for 15 years now. He became a Chelsea fan via his admiration for the legendary goalkeeper Petr Cech and his heroics in the UEFA Champions League final against Manchester United in 2008.

He was completely sold on Chelsea four years later when the Blues would eventually lift the UEFA Champions League trophy, thanks to Petr Cech's performance in the shootouts against Bayern Munich.

Jigar talks about how he keeps going back to those clippings of Petr Cech to feel motivated and inspired.

"I played a game in a tournament in college. I was the goalkeeper as usual. In the first round, we were playing against Russia. There was a penalty shootout in the finals. At that moment I had this thought that whatever it takes, I just have to save these penalties.

I remember I took a break and I was sitting with my phone. I watched the clip (Chelsea vs Bayern Munich UEFA Champions League final) again on Youtube and skipped to the final 3-4 minutes. In my head, I was wearing that helmet, I was wearing those gloves, and I was jumping."

Jigar saved the penalty and he is grateful that there is a video recording of the same as it is a moment he will cherish forever. The brave and upbeat Jigar was struck with Covid-19 while battling in the frontlines and he says that the initial days were horrifying.

He had only just graduated from college and started working at a hospital for 15-20 days when the pandemic hit us. He used to work 18 hours and rest for the next six and this continued on repeat. During the pandemic, Jigar took an inspiring initiative to build a sanitization chamber for a nearby hospital. The chamber was built to decrease the harmful effects of the pre-existing chambers, which had the risk of alcohol-based sanitizers being sprayed all over your body and lower the cost of setting up the chambers for the hospitals. The nearby hospital didn’t set up Jigar’s sanitization chamber, but it eventually got a lot of positive responses from other organizations.

Industries took notice of what this chamber could help them implement during the pandemic at a much lower cost as compared to what other big companies were asking for.

While doing all the inspiring work during the pandemic for the community, Jigar got hit by COVID-19 and had to be hospitalized. Jigar, being the out-and-out Blue that he is, asked his family to send his laptop over and he started watching the 2012 Champions League semi-final against Barcelona and the final against Bayern Munich on loop. Jigar says that if Chelsea wasn't there, he doesn't know what else he could have got so engrossed in that he stopped worrying about his condition.

One of Jigar Mistry’s dreams is to go to Stamford Bridge and watch Chelsea play and when he does go there, he says he will wear the full Chelsea kit with the Petr Cech helmet to go with it.

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