Football Slowly Emerges in India

As I write these words, Nicolas Anelka’s team is getting ready to play against one led by Roberto Carlos. Wait, who’s playing who? Chelsea? Real Madrid? Am I referring to some TV replay of a game from few years back? No. Anelka now plays for Mumbai City, while Roberto Carlos leads Delhi Dynamos. Both teams are a part of India’s fresh, much-hyped, and vastly financed football league, the ISL (Indian Super League).

While the British introduced both cricket and football to India, the latter game, though also having a long tradition in the subcontinent, has been clearly overshadowed by the former for decades. India’s national team last mattered in the 1950s and its present record is dismal. The Hero I-League, founded in 2007, lacks a significant following and had problems finding sponsors.

This, however, does not mean that football is a forgotten sport in India. The FIFA World Cup is followed intently. Well-known teams such as Bayern Munich have played exhibition matches on Indian pitches and the game’s legendary players have received an enthusiastic welcome during their visits (the most recent example is Pelé). Not only the global championships, but some of the world’s most famous leagues are now regularly aired in the Country of Cricket.

In West Bengal – formerly part of the first province to have been conquered by the British and is now one of the areas where football enjoys the most popularity – the stadium of Atlético de Kolkata attracts considerable crowds. Another state where football is popular is Goa, a long-time Portuguese colony. While India’s North-East region may be under-represented in the country in many other ways, the names of players from small states such as Mizoram or Meghalaya are easily found in team registers. Clearly, football in India likes the hilly areas and mountains. Probably the best-known Indian player, Baichung Bhatia, hails from Sikkim in the Indian Himalayas, while the present captain of the national team, Sunil Chhetri, is of Nepalese descent.

Two years ago, the rising tide of football’s popularity brought a new professional league to Indian shores. The ISL, or the Indian Super League, founded in 2013 and kicked off in 2014 was –contrary to the older I-League – flooded with money and ambition from the start. The league’s prime sponsor is Reliance, one of the biggest private companies in the country. While it was not uncommon for some of Bollywood’s actors to invest part of their savings in cricket teams, a few now decided to put their money in football. John Abraham owns NorthEast United while Abhishek Bacchan co-owns Chennaiyin. You could argue that in a way cricket’s popularity is actually helping football in India, as some of the cricket stars – Mahendra Singh Dhoni, Sourav Ganguly, and Sachin Tendulkar – have also opted to co-fund and co-own the new football teams. Other investors include Indian businessmen and foreign enterprises, such as Atlético Madrid, which has its shares in Atlético de Kolkata.

Famous names have appeared on the field. Alessandero der Piero and Roberto Carlos play for the Delhi Dynamos, David Trezeguet was hired by Pune City, and Robert Pirès has worn FC Goa colors. The list goes on. Each of the ISL teams features a considerable foreign presence, often around half the team, many of them with Hispanic surnames. Foreign professionals hold other positions, such as Matt Radcliffe, the Pune City physiotherapist who crossed over from Manchester United. None of the current ISL team coaches is Indian.

However, while the first goals have been already scored, the founders’ main goals are yet to be fulfilled. At present, the ISL consists of eight teams and the season lasts for a little more than two months (but in the second case India’s weather conditions must also be considered). Some of the more famous foreign players double as coaches. The other doubling is the curious existence of two leagues at the same time: the I-League and the Indian Super League. While the I-League is less popular and less well funded, it includes some of the oldest and most experienced teams in India. A considerable number of current ISL players are in fact currently on lease from the I-League. As such, both leagues to a degree lack what the other possesses and it would probably be wise to merge them, although this does not seem to be on the cards. Many of the foreign stars who play for the ISL are past their peak, and many may mock the ISL as a pre-retirement league. However, with their resources the teams will surely be able to recruit younger players as well.

The creation of the second league does not also necessarily mean that professional football is extending its geographical reach within India. The core territories of the ISL actually overlap with those of the I-League. Grouping the two leagues together, the states/territories represented are Maharashtra, Goa, Karnataka, Kerala, Delhi, West Bengal and the North-East (Meghalaya in case of the I-League). In another words, most of the Indian states (there are 29 of them), including some of the most important ones, do not have a team in either league. The road to building a truly national league remains long, but signs of football’s growing popularity are visible across the country.

There is also one more aspect, an important one for football in India in the long run. The new teams have also opened schools to develop talent. Thousands of children have flocked to them. While this generation of young Indians may still mostly just watch football, a growing number of the next one will actually be playing it.