Tuesday, March 28, 2017

All India Football Reliance

FIFA President Gianni Infantino. 
So, someone who’s allegedly linked to a 'cricket' corruption can also pick a national 'football' coach?

The day I posted it on my FB timeline, there were few likes from some journalists, ex-footballers and football lovers.

The recent juggling of the various AIFF committees and sub-committees may force us to rethink if PP and Co. are really serious about the sport in India after they officially included its marketing partners in important decision-making bodies.

It’s also rare for commercial partners or sponsors to be given decision-making roles in national sports federations, but why AIFF has allotted the spaces to some including one, who was allegedly involved in cricket’s IPL corruption in 2013, is anybody’s guess.

I had an interesting chat on the topic with one of the senior journalists, who had covered more cricket than football.

He defended AIFF and blasted the top Calcutta clubs for having killed the game.

“If R is pushing the cash in the game, won’t they want their men to handle the show. Isn’t it obvious? It’s better than pozi cash coming to the clubs in gunny sacks. If the Indian Super League is drawing crowds and getting sponsors, why rant?” he asked.

I've no issues with money being pumped into the sport, but interference from sponsors is unwarranted. We also can’t rule out their demoniacal presence in the multiple committees.

Do we see Barclays' people in the Premier League management or FIFA being guided by their commercial partners? If a franchisee sells chicken burgers to its clients, it doesn't mean it has the right to sell football too just because it’s sponsoring some events.

When I told my journalist friend that Shyam Thapa, who will now head the new technical committee, have a better technical acumen than someone from cricket, he chucked, “Thapa is a dead wood. He doesn't even follow modern football. I consider PP a double dead wood. So let's flow with the tide.”

My friend supported the idea of having people from the commercial partners, but didn’t want Thapa. I really got confused with his unbalanced opinions, but I can’t blame him because anyone will find it difficult to solve this tricky AIFF theorem.

Meanwhile, the two top Bengalis in the federation — one non-resident and the other original — batted in favour of SR. They’re Indian football’s ‘Johor-Bhanu’ — Bengali films all-time famous comedians.

It was also funny to read one of their comments, “Everything is related to commercial exploitation. We wanted an outsider to tell us, with his BCCI experience, how we can actually improve the technical committee’s decision making.”

Monday, March 20, 2017

It’s difficult to forget the years in Calcutta: Amalraj


Amalraj introduces Mohammad Akbar, Surajit Sengupta
and Moidul Islam to legendary actor Dilip Kumar during a
Rovers Cup match in Bombay in 1980. Credit: Amalraj
My late dad was my encyclopedia on Calcutta football.

“Look at this player. Jersey No.14. He’s Amalraj. John’s brother,” he used to tell me whenever Victor Amalraj popped up on the TV screen during the Doordarshan years when the channel beamed the Derby live across the drawing rooms of several families in Bengal.

But I always wondered why Amalraj had that brooding and a serious expression as a player. In fact, I’ve not seen his smiling faces in any of the photographs from the 70s and 80s magazines.

Yet, he was an effective midfielder who possessed excellent passing and shooting skills. He also had the knack of being at the right spot at the right time, a quality liked by his coaches and team-mates at Mohun Bagan, East Bengal, Mohammedan Sporting and Indian national team.

I met him for the first time during my visit to Hyderabad at the Food Corporation of India (FCI) office at HACA Bhawan in Nampally last year.

The mention of Calcutta evoked memories of his wonderful years spent with the top clubs. His face lit up like a 1000-watt neon lamp.

“I miss Calcutta. I’ve played 14 years there. You’ve made me nostalgic. The city is close to my heart. It was my home. I can’t forget the years I’ve spent there,” said Amalraj, who made his debut in Calcutta with Sporting in 1978.

“It’s one of the fabulous cities which respect footballers. Even the washer men and rickshaw-pullers recognised and praised us, but I think the scene has changed in the last two decades. Football has lost a large part of its identity to cricket,” he said.  

Just like his elder brother John, who passed away in 2015, he earned fame and popularity in a city where top footballers gave Bengal film icons a run for their money in the seventies and eighties. Such was their charm and star appeal that most of the magazines during that era had cover stories on them.

John, who led Sporting to Calcutta League title in 1967, was a huge influence on him.

“He pushed me to go to Calcutta after Andhra Pradesh beat Bengal in the B C Roy Trophy final in 1976. I scored the only goal in the match. Railways offered me a job, but my brother advised me to go to Calcutta,” said Amalraj, a Deputy General Manager at FCI.

“I want to take a stroll at the Park Street and have snacks at the Flurys followed by a spicy dinner at the Amber. I would love to spend a day in Calcutta,” added the former feisty midfielder, who went to Calcutta in the late 70s.

As a schoolboy, he started at the Secunderabad-based Bolarum Sporting in the Senior Division Rahim League in 1974-75. 
Credit: Amalraj

Bolarum has produced some of India’s greatest footballers including Anthony Patrick, KP Dhanraj, Dharmalingam Kannan, Peter Thangaraj, Tulasidas Balaram all whom played in Calcutta.

Asked why football is dead in his own city, he said, “We need a sports culture in the schools, which lack infrastructure. The kids have a difficult choice to make between academics and sports. With such constraints, it’s difficult to produce good players. We can expect talent from small towns and villages, but not from cities. I'm hopeful that the U-17 World Cup in India will help develop the sport."  


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