Indian Football : Not a crib but just some thoughts

Last week I spoke with a friend who has deep rooted connections with a very stellar club of India,Mohun Bagan.

I did not know that Mohun Bagan has a similar business model to Bayern Munich i.e. it is majorly a public owned club and depends on contributions from these members for its functioning , expenditures and in return, the shareholders have voting rights and plus they have that special feeling of ‘owning ‘ a part of the club.

My mate’s family has been involved with the club for the past 30 years now. So obviously within a matter of minutes the discussion became very India centric.



Sunil Chetri’s signing with the MLS club , Kansas City Wizards was obviously the first thing we discussed. I think after Baichung Bhutia’s brief spell at FC Bury in England this is probably the biggest overseas signing for an Indian.With such a big population it is a bit strange that we can only boast of 2 players who have tried their luck abroad.

It’s always been a question in my mind as to why there are no talent scouts who visit India .Arsene Wenger for example has an army of talent scouts (allocated on a continent business) who travel the length and breadth of the world looking for talented young players, ranging from 12 year olds to experienced players who they then try to recruit into the Arsenal training academy in London.Wenger has scouts in places like Brazil, Ivory Coast, Russia,Japan, The European Continent…so why not in India ?

My friend was of the opinion that this is mainly because there are no agents to represent players here. Big European clubs usually never like dealing with players directly. They prefer an in-between who is well versed in business, negotiation skills and of course a deep rooted knowledge of the game. Unfortunately, here in India these sort of agent representation is almost nonexistent. Players usually try to put in their own money to contact clubs and agents from abroad and invariably end up losing all of it. We only get talent scouts from places like Bangladesh and Sri Lanka who come to take a look at the players. Apparently, there are a few certifications from FIFA that can be cleared in order to become an official agent but the handful of agents here are most probably not qualified.



I believe this is an important point. In a nation which even Sepp Blatter has termed the “Sleeping Giant Of Football” surely there would be quite a few youngsters out there with the talent to qualify for academies abroad. Secondly, I am sure 2 is not a true representation of the number of players who can be tried in foreign leagues. We do not need to look only at Europe and the US.I think the Japanese and Chinese leagues will also prove as invaluable experience for some of our players. I am sure if the price is right and they are kept comfortable and goal driven they would have no problems to play in these leagues.



For Indian football to improve we need to get a few of our players in foreign leagues. It’s only through this sort of experience that players can become conversant with new training techniques, technologies and strategies and then , most importantly bring this knowledge home.



So one thing we narrowed upon were : Lack of Agents who can represent players and hence lack of opportunities abroad




We then got talking about the academies in India and neither of us could name more than 4.

Tata Football Academy ( who are in a tie up with Arsenal FC), JCT Football Academy, Mohunbagan - SAIL football academy and a few local academies set up by some of the big Indian clubs.

But how much press coverage do you get about these academies. I consider me and a few mates pretty ardent followers of the game ( local and international) and even we could not think of many.

To make matters worse my mate narrated an incident which gave me a good feel of how bad things are.

When my mate was studying for his engineering he was next door to a training academy of a reputed Indian club. Purely out of interest he went about understanding how things are run there and found one major flaw. This academy was trying to attract children from the city to join the academy. Now we all know cricket rules the roost in cities. So forget children, a parent would think twice before sending his/her kid to a football training academy when all the moolah is in cricket. My mate felt that the target audience itself was wrong. Since Cricket is the sport of choice in the cities we should try to look at villages and the game should be introduced at grassroot levels here. The replies he got was



"bahut mahnat karna padega yaar" ( will be too hard)
"paisa tu dega?" ( will you fund this)
"dekh lena mene jo jo ladka choose kia he ye saal sab star hoga...kahin jane ki jarurat nehi he" ( all the lads I have chosen will be stars no need to go anywhere)
"tu kar sakta he to kar" ( if you can implement this go ahead)





So another conclusion : A lack of good academies and even those around lack a defined market and purpose. Plus I think the staff themselves lack belief in what they are doing. Grassroot level football is encouraged by all big clubs in the UK.

I did some more thinking on the same and came up with a few points.

More on this in the next post

The Official Biography Of Arsenal Footbal Club - Steve Stammers

Some wonderful facts about Arsenal Football Club


- Arsenal FC was formed in a pub and the guy who thought of starting a football club was a Scot

- they were originally a south london club and then shifted north as it was thought to be commercially viable

- the first team to get an underground station named after a football team

- Sir henry Norris the chairman of the club was originally the chairman of Fulham and there was a time he was the chairman of both teams till the FA asked him to choose one

- Through the 30s Arsenal had a Chelsea type image..they were setting record transfers almost every year..they played a team in the FA once which was worth 2000 pounds and just the Arsenal players shoes was worth 1800 pounds at that point !!!

- Closely associated with both world wars since most team players were working in the ammunitions factory, a lot of players went to serve in the wars.During this team as a goodwill gesture stars from other teams stepped in to play for Arsenal ..including one Bill Shankly ( the great Liverpool legend)

- The legendary cricket player Dennis Compton and his younger brother Leslie both played for Arsenal.During the second world war Dennis Compton served in India

Just some of the wonderful facts contained in the beautifully written “The Official Biography Of Arsenal” by Steve Stammers


Stammers is a respected football journalist in London who has been writing for leading dailies for nearly 35 years now.He has a wealth of knowledge and wonderful way of writing.I finished this 300 + page book in just 2 sittings.


The best part of this book is that it is not just a celebration of a football club but a tribute to the working class's beautiful game.It talks about how football has been interlinked with the British culture from the early 1900s ,through the two world wars, the swinging sixties, through the seventies and eighties till what it has become today.

In fact the story of football in the UK is quite similar to that of hockey in india except that unfortunately in our case hockey got lost in layers of bureaucracy and the general public was ignored.Of course everyone wanted to make a buck out of football in the UK too but public interest was never forgotten ( similar to the Bundesliga in Germany)


The best part about this book is apart from the brilliant way in which the history of the club unfolds before your eyes you also get a glimpse into how football in Britain was affected through the ages because of

- the two world wars
- unemployement
- hooliganism through the 80s
- the Munich Air Disaster
- The Heysel and Hillsborough tragedies
- professionalism
- entry of foreign players into the league

Wonderfully written,almost like a fairy tale, the outstanding classic photographs of the club,London,Highbury, supporters and of course players greatly enhance the reading experience.

I think this is one of the best football books i have read.If you are an Arsenal supporter you should read this and if you are not i still encourage you to read it. You will fall in love with the beautiful game all over again.

Oh Yeah ! i am back

was caught up with work and and a whole host of other activities including being lazy but now i am back and what a day to be back

Pune has an IPL team...yesterday Sahara Pariwar accquired rights for Pune's very own IPL franchise for a whooping 1702 crores making Pune the costliest IPL team ever.Even Lalit Modi was surprised at the amount the new Pune and Kochi teams fetched.Initially when he made the claim that in 5 years IPL could be bigger than EPL there were a few scoffs but if things continue like this anything can happen.

feels wonderful to be back....and yeah i'm bigger,badder and better as well this time round