“Indian football is no longer in the ICU.” Subhas Bhowmick, the only Indian coach to win an Asian club title,the ASEAN Cup with East Bengal in 2003, may finally have favourable things to say about the state of the sport in the country, but chances are Indian football may still be suffering from blurred vision.
Priyaranjan Dasmunsi, who ruled Indian football for two decades, launched the Vision 2010 with much fanfare but little groundwork. It came as no surprise then that Vision 2010 – ostensibly a timeframe to qualify for football’s biggest showpiece in South Africa: the World Cup – soon became Vision 2014 after Lebanon ended India’s campaign in the qualifiers after just two games. Still, if anyone listens to what national coach Bob Houghton has to say, 2018, or even beyond, may seem like wishful thinking.
It’s like asking for the moon for a country that, while dominating regional competitions – India’s under-23 squad won the ‘regional World Cup’, the SAFF Cup – since the start of the competition, has never come close to troubling any of the continent’s leading nations.
“We can match the best in the continent when playing at home, but we need to improve our record abroad. We need to play more away games ahead of the Asian Cup (2011),” India captain Bhaichung Bhutia had said. India’s last away win came, ironically, against Bhutan who not too long ago came out trumps against Montserrat in a FIFA-sanctioned friendly to decide the worst football team in the world!
IM Vijayan, arguably India’s most gifted striker in the nineties, agrees with Bhutia’s thinking that we can only improve if we consistently rub shoulders with the best in business. “It’s only when we play against the big names that the players’ confidence will be on the rise. The India team trained at Barcelona for a while and look what it did to the players’ confidence. When you find yourself on a field, like one in Barcelona, training takes an entirely different meaning,” says Vijayan, who insists India’s infrastructure leaves a lot to be desired.
The current AIFF president, Praful Patel, nods in agreement when reminded of just how far behind we are in terms of infrastructural facilities. If we had enough in our own backyard, Houghton wouldn’t be left fuming and pointing fingers at the sports ministry. “We need small but beautiful grounds. I think 100 grounds like this one is the need of the hour,” he had said when the Indian team went to the Cuncolim ground, some 10km away from Margao in South Goa.
AIFF general secretary Alberto Colaco, who has been at the helm of Indian football’s affairs for a decade, blames India’s relative lack of international success on lack of human resources.
“Successful teams are those with strong domestic leagues. And for a strong league, at least in India, we need human resources to tackle marketing and event management. Yes, there is a severe dearth of human resources,” admitted Colaco.
India has been perennially dubbed a sleeping giant by FIFA, the governing body for football, but according to Bhowmick, there “are positive tell-tale signs that Indian football is moving in the right direction” .
The tell-tale signs that Bhowmick talks about is engineered by Houghton, who is aiming to turn Indian football into a continental power, just the way he tried and succeeded with China and Uzbekistan. “Bob is driving Indian football in the right direction. When I met him for the first time, he said India’s ranking and improvement are directly linked. If we improve on our ranking, at least in Asia, we would avoid the big guns at the first hurdle. The idea of earning points in smaller tournaments and improving upon ranking appeals to me,” explains Bhowmick. There are signs that Indian football is out of its medical emergency-like situation and it has been cured of many of its ailments, but while Houghton has achieved his primary aim of qualifying for the finals of the Asian Cup 2011 – even though it came from an easier route of winning the AFC Challenge Cup – it seems too soon to set sights beyond Asia.
Courtsey: The Times of India
