It has become a vicious cycle as Indians don’t get opportunities to prove their worth and so demand for foreign coaches has increased.
New Delhi (India): In just over five years since the start of the Indian Super League (ISL), the demand of the Indian coaches have suddenly nosedived.
It would be wrong to say that ISL has dumped the Indians, but indirectly the franchise league has even inspired the I-League to follow the trend of ignoring home-grown trainers.
I-League, which starts on Saturday (November 30), will feature seven foreign coaches, three from Spain and one each from Cyprus, Scotland, Singapore and Portugal.
Stanley Rozario (Aizawl FC), Gift Raikhan (Neroca), Chun Yan Law (Punjab FC) and Floyd Pinto (Indian Arrows) are the Indians who will manage their respective teams in the competition.
Yan Law has a foreign sounding name, but is a Chinese resident of Calcutta. He will make his debut with former champions Minerva (2018), renamed as Punjab FC.
Last season, five of the 11 teams had foreign coaches — Spaniards Alejandro Menendez (East Bengal) and Manuel Retimero Fraille (Neroca), David Roberston (Scotland, Real Kashmir), Romanian Petre Gigiu (Churchill Brothers) and Singapore’s Akbar Nawas with champions Chennai City.
Fernando Varela (Spain) was with Gokulam briefly last season also but then left for family reasons.
Indians are either underemployed or unemployed
At present, there are over 7,500 qualified and licensed football coaches in the country, but many of them are either underemployed or unemployed.
They spend their own money (from INR 1 to 2.5lakhs) to acquire an A license or Pro License degree, but don’t get good salaries as there is no clear road map for Indian football.
From 2011-2019, 36 major clubs including JCT, Mahindra United, Royal Wahingdoh, DSK Shivajians, Mumbai FC and Pune FC have shut down.
Goan clubs Dempo, Salgaocar and Sporting Clube de Goa have downsized their teams and only participate in the city league.
But then with so many clubs closing down, opportunity for Indian coaches has reduced drastically.
Barca, Madrid effect: Popularity of Spanish coaches
There were four Spanish coaches in the 2018-19 ISL. Champions Bengaluru FC had Carlos Cuadrat, FC Goa was trained by Sergio Lobera, Josep Gombao coached Delhi Dynamos (now renamed Odisha FC) and Miguel Angel Portugal was with the defunct Pune City FC.
Now the trend of hiring Spanish coaches is evident in the I-Legaue also.
Pic: KhelupdatesThree I-League clubs have Spanish coaches — Kibu Vicuna (Mohun Bagan), Alejandro Menendez (East Bengal) and Fernando Santiago Varela (Gokulam Kerala).
Roberston (Scotland) continues with Real Kashmir and Singapore’s Nawas with champions Chennai City.
Former East Bengal midfielder Douglas D’Silva, who played in 2002-03 and 2003-04 seasons, will make his debut as a Technical Director with newly-promoted Trau FC while Dimitris Dimitriou (Cyprus) will be their coach.
Why Indian coaches being ignored?
Since the last decade the trend of foreign coaches has become an integral part of the Indian psyche, for fans on social media, the All India Football Federation and Football Sports Development Limited.
This craze for foreign coaches is often based on the erroneous assumption that they have some secret formula or magic wand to help improve our players.
It has become a vicious cycle as Indians don’t get opportunities to prove their worth and so demand for foreign coaches has increased.
Pro license isn’t enough to get good salary
Even Pro license Indian coaches cannot aim to work among the top tier ten ISL franchises due to certain league rules.
Only a high-profile coach with significant experience and record or a non-high profile coach with significant experience and a proven track record or high-profile international footballer with the required coaching license can be hired by the ISL clubs.
So qualified and successful Indian coaches like Sanjoy Sen (ATK) and Derrick Pereira (FC Goa) can only work as assistants, and often functioning as cheerleaders or looking after equipment.
Drastic changes in two decades
The neglect of Indian coaches has only increased in this decade.
In the opening two editions of NFL, only Dempo had foreign coaches — Walter Ormeno (Peru) in 1997 and Francisco Goncalves da Silva (Brazil) in 1998.
In the 9th NFL in 2005, four Goan clubs had local coaches — Armando Colaco (Dempo), Derrick Pereira (Vasco), Savio Madeira (Salgaocar) and Norbert Gonsalves (Fransa).
Pic: Khelupdates The only exceptions were Shabbir Ali (Churchill Brothers) and Clifford Chukwama, a Nigerian who had settled in Goa, with Sporting Clube de Goa.
The Calcutta clubs also had local coaches, Subash Bhowmick (East Bengal) and Subroto Bhattacharya (Mohun Bagan).
Why Indian coaches are necessary
Quality Indian coaches are needed. They can also only develop their expertise if they get big match experience. The long-term effect of not providing Indian coaches ample opportunities could be disastrous for the development of football in the country.
Thanks for this very informative article by Novy Kapadia about the plight of Indian football coaches. With many clubs closing down, employment opportunities for them gets restricted. If they don’t get employed by even I League clubs how will they prove their worth. I was told that there are over 200 A license coaches in India. I wonder what work they are doing? Are they doing any worthwhile coaching or have their efforts to get a coaching degree gone waste?
Truly written and need to look into in this matter