Is ISL really good for Indian football?

Zico

Zico, Alessandro Del Piero, Nicolas Anelka, and even Marco Materazzi.  

Big names, yes, but they aren’t carrying any magical wand which can change overnight Indian football’s fortune.

By having these veteran stars in a pajama football called Indian Soccer League, if the federation thinks it’s one of the biggest things to happen in the country, then I’m sure they are taking all of us for a bumpy ride.

Today, the Indian team had another disastrous outing at the Asian Games in Incheon. We’re used to such humiliation after every four years. At the other end, the federation is all geared up to host the pajama-drama and still claims that developing football in Indian through the retired world stars is a kind of a revolution.

Someone in the officialdom must be kidding.

Losing out to a strife-torn Afghanistan in SAFF Championship followed by a defeat against Pakistan at home in a friendly last month are some of the recent performances of our national teams. Why the team was sent to Korea when we know the team lack both quality and stamina?

Actually, we’re thick-skinned.

There is no return on the investment made on such tours and tournaments which only brings disappointment. If we simply judge from the business point of view, sending team to the Games was a sheer wastage of money. It’s the officials who actually benefit from these tours, and since most of them now know the art of Facebooking, they will definitely post their tour pictures on the wall.

Actually, it’s difficult to put a benchmark for these short-sighted officials. The AIFF should immediately stop sending the teams to international tournaments. Ideally, they should focus on how to develop players from the grass-root level.

I don’t remember the last time when AIFF did something sensible. Probably, they didn’t do anything in the last 20 years. When it came to promoting the game, it’s all about touch-and-go.

If National Football League was invented in 1996, it was replaced with I-League in 2007. And within seven years, the parent body actually killed the national league with another venture which won’t really improve the deplorable standard.

As for the U-17 World Cup, we just want to be a “good host”, that’s the bottom line. Result or the urge to do well in a top junior event has never been the motto.

Here in Doha, the European coaches and even the Arabs make fun of our players.

After watching the U-19 team here in the AFC qualifiers last October, one former coach of a top Spanish club said, “C’mon your boys can’t even stand 90 minutes”!