Published by Jaago Re! on Thu, 07/15/2010 - 15:14 , 0 comments
If you’re a soccer fan, we suppose you have already seen the Football Fever! If you haven’t, please check it out before you read further! It’s hilarious. It’s outrageous. It shows what’s wrong with us and our football.
Could there ever be a pain greater than that of a soccer fan in India? Every four years, they know they don’t have any choice other than to bear up with the failure of our national squad to make it to the 32-nation global tournament.
One might ask: ‘Why does the cricket crazy India never qualify for the World Cup?' Well, please tell how many Indian footballers do you know apart from Baichung Bhutia? One? Two? Very few? No, it’s not enough to blame the media alone for such indifference. Any diehard Indian soccer fan would be able to tell you that we really suffer badly from the dearth of talented players. Also, we don’t have qualified coaches or the necessary infrastructure at the grassroots level. And our senior footballers are languishing for a competitive structure and a better organization at the national level for a zillion years!
Yet, despite all these problems, we still dream about the World Cup. No?
When Tata Tea started Jaago Re Soccer Stars in 2007, we aimed to awaken and strengthen the soccer spirit of India by promoting the beautiful game among the school children. Our young talents rarely got access to the best in terms of infrastructure or training before that. Soccer Stars partnered with Arsenal FC to identify and nurture grassroots football talent in India and to create an international platform where they could exhibit their talent.
When Jaago Re Soccer Stars tournament had arrived, our young talents from four regions and ten different cities finally had something to look forward to! Ask any ‘soccer-crazy’ kid, we’re not exaggerating! The best 30 players out of the tournament would get a lifetime opportunity to get trained by Arsenal Coaches both in India and in London! The best 16 of them would then go to London to participate in the Arsenal International Soccer Festival! And it didn’t end there! In order to create careers beyond the festival, Soccer Stars tied up Tata Football Academy (TFA) with this wonderful opportunity to spot and absorb any exceptional talent into the academy directly.
Once Baichung Bhutia said that the lack of necessary infrastructure and the best of training facilities were the two main reasons for the slow or zero growth of soccer in India. Our boys proved just that when they won the Plate cup at the Arsenal International Soccer Festival in 2008. It was the first time ever that India won the cup in the history of soccer! Our young Indian soccer stars Mozaffar Ali, Biswajit Sardar, Sumit Das, Arindam Mitra and Rickin Dang reconfirmed our belief that if our boys are provided with the right training and facilities, they could certainly triumph at the global stage.
Isn’t it about time we did something to wake up India—the sleeping soccer giant?
If you don’t want to see our Indian national flag among the fluttering of 32 national flags in the World Cup soon, we’re really sorry! We didn’t know you were such a huge fan of Football Fever, not the football.
Jaago Re!
