It is a shame that the All India Football Federation has not been able to convert the enormous interest for the game into something more tangible—like an increase in the number of quality players. There does exist a wide base—all that's needed is a good net to catch the talent. But it seems like AIFF has turned its back on those possibilities, leaving it to the hotels and corporates to cash in on the World Cup.
Football author Jaydeep Basu reckons that the failure of the AIFF's Youth Development Programme is a good reflection of the football administrators' lack of vision. "Here's an opportunity to cash in on a mass following for the sport but the AIFF has not spent any time discussing the YDP in the past five or six general body meetings. FIFA and the Asian Football Confederation have been pushing AIFF to get the YDP off the board, but in vain," he says.
FIFA is keen for India to take to football in a big way but the sleeping giant only wakes up once every four years. "We have never seen ourselves as a football powerhouse," says Raghunath—and the AIFF seems to agree. It is such official apathy that makes young players like Raahil Chopra to look for a future beyond the sport they love so much. "We have the talent in India but it is not developed. I may have to stop playing football after I pass out of school, since I do not see any career prospects in football," he says, speaking for a vast majority of the young who will graduate from being player-watchers, to being just watchers.
However, for four weeks, these fans will make sure that soccer T-shirts will vanish faster than they can come in from Thailand. They will guzzle pitchers of beer this summer as they cheer for teams from distant lands. As they celebrate the action, they won't be wasting much thought on Sandeep Nandy, Kalyan Chaube and Israt Kamal—India's three goalkeepers in theAFC Asian Cup in February this year.
