Indian football still has miles to go
Indian football is on the verge of a new development. After winning its first ever Nehru Cup recently, the team is on the seventh heaven and the upcoming World Cup qualifier has been brought alive by the recent success of the Indian team. India after getting a recent jump in the Federation Inerternationale de Football Association (FIFA) rankings reached 145 place (Highest in past few years). But the big question is- “Can we on the basis of India’s recent feats bet on India’s qualification for the 2020 Olympics?”
The answer would be a definite ‘No’ if we go by the opinion of the Indian football coach, Bob Houghton. India has to play its qualifier against Lebanon on October 8 in Lebanon and then in India on October 20.
The Indian coach who has had a successful stint with the team till now considers that it would not be enough to provide good facilities at the senior level only, rather Indian football needs to have good coaches and better facilities at the junior level also . It will help the budding young players to learn the nuances of the game earlier.
In the decades of 50’s and 60’s, Indian football was in its golden era when it not only won two gold medals in Asian Games, but also finished fourth in the 1956 Melbourne Olympics. But after that, the graph of the team’s success has been going south, and now, leave alone qualifying for the Olympics, India has been finding it hard even to compete with their Asian counterparts.
Though India has not always been a great football playing nation in the past few decades, but the efforts should be made constantly to improve its standard, rather than just sit back and let things go the way they are going. All India Football Federation (AIFF) has taken new strides in that direction, ever since Union Minister for Information and Broadcasting, Priya Ranjan Dasmunsi has taken over as the President of the federation, but the efforts to revive football has to be consistent and long term.
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