Japan has earned the distinction of being the first Asian country to beat a South American nation in the FIFA World Cup finals. The defining moment happened during a group league match where Japan defeated Columbia 2-1. On the other hand, Iran was very near to cause an upset when it hold European nation Portugal to a draw. It is heartening to see that, in the ongoing tournament to decide the best football nation in the world, Asian countries are performing well and much above the expectations. The performances of the Asian teams have proved that the nations are no longer pushed over in the competition. These nations do not lack in skill, strength or stamina. What these nations need is more experiences of playing at the top level. Once it is achieved, no football giants will be able to take them lightly.
In such a scenario, the obvious question which comes to our mind is when will India make us proud by taking on big football nations in a World Cup? Will we continue to cheer for others throughout our lives? Where are we lacking? If we undertake a journey to the past we will find that India was among the Asian football giants till early sixties. In 1962 India won Gold in football at the Jakarta Games. In the fifties and sixties India used to beat many Asian nations quite comfortably. India even beat Australia by a huge margin of 7-0 in the mid-fifties. Then later, 14 years after winning the Gold at Jakarta Games, India became the joint winners of the Asian Youth Championship in Teheran. Iran, the country with whom India shared the coveted trophy, is now participating in the World Cup and is among the top 32 football nations of the world. But India is barely managing to be in the top 100 list. We have no worthwhile success in recent times. The condition of Indian football is so pathetic that these days we even think qualifying for Asian Cup as a major achievement.
It is not that India does not have football talents as it had during the fifties and sixties. As a matter of fact there is no dearth of talents in India. The problem lies with vision. In our country, apart from the few academies run through personal efforts, no effort is being made by the All India Football Federation (AIFF) to identify budding talents. Popular football tournaments like Rovers Cup, Nagjee Cup, Stafford Cup, no longer exists. Although tournaments like Durand Cup, IFA Shield and Bordoloi Trophy are still being organised, these tournaments have clearly lost their sheen. Good performances in these tournaments often go unnoticed. I-league was introduced to improve the standard of Indian football but suddenly it is going to be replaced by Indian Super League (ISL), a tournament which is not even recognised by FIFA, the governing body of football in the world and completely run by a big business house of the country. It is as if AIFF is eager to surrender before the business house just to get rid of its responsibility to develop football in the country.
But as football lovers we still cherish the dream that one day the tricolour will also shine at the world football arena and the icing on the cake will be a Northeasterner running down the middle keeping the opponent defenders on their toes. Hope that dream will become a reality soon.
