It is a black day for Goan Football when team owners of I- League from Goa, Sporting de Goa and Salgaoncar Sports club decided to pull out from the I-League tournament. The owners of the Goan teams are die hard football lovers and have ventured into Goan and Indian football. They have brought laurels to the state, put Goa on the footballing map and build many careers for the young Goan footballers. I feel very sorry for their decisions and hence call it the dark day for Goan football.
Sporting de Goa has followed all the conditions set by FIFA and AFC for Professional clubs. They have a strong grassroot programme for all age group which is mandatory for all Professional clubs. To dump them this way is totally unjustified. I disagree by the AIFF outburst saying that the people who flocked to watch all ISL matches don’t know anything about football.
With cable TV available in almost every home and millions of Indians watching foreign professional leagues they are definitely learning by watching great players play and thereby grow as fans of football.
For any sports or team to be a crowd puller you need to have the best marketable players who can bring in the crowd to the stadium and create a support base for teams. You need to have a market team and money to do that too. We can’t go by passion all the time, this sleeping giant of Asia India needs to be awakened and attract public to the stadiums and give them the best of football. The crowd came in large numbers to see Football stars (Marquee players) though they had passed their prime age of football careers. This only shows that Indian public that flocked to the ISL matches are all knowledgeable football followers, maybe not of Indian League.
We are yet to go a long way in football with India’s world ranking at 150 plus. We have to give this sport its due importance by establishing the grassroot programme like all foreign professionals club who play in their leagues. That’s why our former Chief Minister Manohar Parrikar, now Defence Minister, declared football as the state’s sports and went on to establish GFDC, a grassroot football programme. I hope AIFF will listen to the Goan team owners and have a workable solution to their grievances. Viva Goa, viva Goa football.
