Indian soccer needs a header

NEW DELHI: Anybody heard of the Millennium Cup? The Millennium Soccer Cup is seen as a cruel joke played on Indian football at a time when it is at its lowest ebb. And in its sad story lies the sorry tale of Indian soccer. A pity, there appears to be no vision to promote a sport that''s universally so popular. How has India benefited by organising the Millennium Cup? Congress MP Priyaranjan Dasmunshi, who was recently re-elected as president of the All India Football Federation for a fourth term of four years, billed it as the greatest show of the region.But can he sell the idea of creating a soccer culture in India with such nondescript tournaments staged in huge empty stadia. In places like Kochi and Kolkata, where they pack the arena for any and every game, fans reportedly shied away. Why? Because these so-called international matches played between tweedledum and tweedledee aren''t really paisa vasool stuff. In typical Indian style, the AIFF is threatening to complain to FIFA about Cameroon and Iraq crying off. But actually, it is the participating teams which are complaining against the organisers for putting up such a shabby show. Indian soccer is in dire straits today. Dasmunshi may take credit for injecting a degree of professionalism in Indian soccer by introducing the National Football League (NFL). But the euphoria lasted barely for a year and thereafter it has been a downhill story, with a steep fall in the standards as well as organisational abilities. Today, the NFL is like any other prize money tournament. The word international has become the buzzword for tapping the market for big-time sponsorship. The winners of the Millennium Cup may be pocketing a cool $150,000 but India is nowhere in the reckoning, except during the inaugural and closing ceremonies. The current debate is on whether the NFL should allow foreign players or not; should the Indian team have a foreign coach, spending a small fortune when there are no signs of improvement. endless debates. For what the game needs right now is a bit of planning and some structured strategy. Now that FIFA too doles out money in the name of youth development programmes, India got a whopping $250,000 last year. But there''s no valid explanation as to how the money has been spent for promoting junior soccer. All we hear is it was used for sending junior teams on overseas junkets. Indian soccer needs to get back to the basics first. The AIFF has no business to kill the summer circuit in the south and the winter circuit in the north. How come there''s no ranking of the clubs in the country even though the NFL is in its fifth year. The Federation Cup, which went into a limbo for the last two years, needs to be revived as part of the summer circuit. In this age of computerisation, it is unthinkable that rankings and transfers are not done professionally. The AIFF has systematically undermined tournaments like Durand, DCM, Rovers and IFA Shield which used to be breeding grounds for soccer talent in the country. More importantly, these tournaments promoted a sound club culture. These must be restored to their health as they provided different styles of play from different regions. The NFL is no answer because no young player will ever get an opportunity to play among the professionals. Then where''s football in the country? Except in Kolkata, Mumbai, Goa, Bangalore, Kerala and Delhi and to some extent in Hyderabad and Punjab, there''s no league anywhere else. The rest of the AIFF units are all part of vote banks. Once Baichung Bhutia, I M Vijayan and Joe Paul Ancheri are through with their soccer, Indian soccer will find it difficult to be visible. No wonder, when Dasmunshi took over India was 90 or so in the FIFA rankings and today it is in the 120s.