New Delhi:
If you say someone, India have qualified for FIFA World Cup then his first reaction will be, really!! Do we have a football team and have such players who can match the class of African and European players in the mega event? It’s a dream which every football lover in India have been seeing from years, but still out of our reach.
It will be very disheartening for the football lovers to know that, India had qualified for the 1950 World Cup, but unable to participate because our so called All India Football Federation felt the event was not so important and secondly, our federation was unable to bear the travel cost which was a shame for us.
Since, 1994 we are participating in the qualifiers regularly but never made it to the second round which is disgrace for us.
In a country of 1.25 billion, we are unable to groom 11 players who can represent the country globally. Our political honchos have to take a call on the matter and have to see beyond cricket in the country.
Small countries like Japan, Turkey, Korea, Ivory Coast, Ghana have produce some wonderful players.
The irony is people don’t even know the name of the nation football coach and players representing the country. A big question arises- does this global sport has a future in cricket crazy country?
