From Sundar Raman to Babul Supriyo, Indian football has made some questionable appointments

There are a lot of reasons to be enthusiastic, for even the most cynical of cynics to be upbeat about this Indian footballing season.

The national team, by virtue of its two victories in the space of a week, may enjoy their highest ranking in 15 years. Aizawl FC are scripting an unlikely fairytale while the country gets ready to host its first ever FIFA tournament, the Under-17 World Cup.

Off the pitch, however, signs are of a federation taking two steps forward and then stumbling backwards in a drunken stupor. Some of the decisions have been downright questionable but none have been more confounding than the appointments made. The federation are not the only ones at fault here, as the clubs have made a couple of questionable hirings themselves.

Sunder Raman

When the All India Football Federation inked a 15-year, 700 crore deal with IMG-Reliance, they hadn’t yet handed over the reins of the game in the country to the sports management consortium, not in a brazen and public manner at least. It was still Praful Patel at the head of the federation, shooting his mouth off about the Blue Tigers qualifying for the 2022 World Cup when the team faces a challenge to try and qualify for the 2019 AFC Asian Cup.

All would seem normal in the world of Indian football then. Come March 2017 and AIFF’s executive committee did something unprecedented when they decided to induct ex-Indian Premier League operating officer and current CEO of Reliance Sports, Sundar Raman into the technical committee. Raman wasn’t the only IMG-R employee inducted into an AIFF committee as seven of his colleagues were drafted into other committees.

Kushal Das, AIFF’s general secretary has since stated that inclusion of IMG-R officials in committees was always part of the deal. The question is, why has it taken this long, seven years after the deal was signed in 2010? The timing, at a juncture when clubs, players and fans are in the dark about a proposed one-league structure where clubs from the Indian Super League, a league backed by IMG-R, may take precedence, throws up more questions than it answers.

IMG-R may be commercial and marketing partners, but the technical committee, the most sacred of them all and very crucial to decisions such as the selection of the national team coach, is a wholly different ball game. FIFA may not be the cleanest of organisations but is highly unlikely that you will ever find Ahmet Muhtar Kent (president of Coca-Cola) in its primary decision-making body.

Not even taking into account that Raman was investigated for his alleged role in the 2013 IPL match-fixing scandal, it was an ill-advised move, fraught with complications over conflicts of interest. The AIFF officials may try and hide all they want behind banners of “great administrator” and “experienced sports professional” but it won’t be long till the “Bik gayi...” memes start.

Babul Supriyo

If Raman’s appointment was questionable, then Babul Supriyo’s appointment as Vice President of the Under-17 World Cup Organising Committee was downright bizarre. One person who welcomed this with open arms, it would seem, was AIFF head honcho Praful Patel.

Now Supriyo dons many hats, that of playback singer, actor, Member of Parliament but his experience as a football administrator is a bit undocumented, for the lack of a better word. Both Patel and Das went down the “fan” route this time to justify Supriyo’s appointment.

Apart from being a passionate football fan, Supriyo also doubles up as part-time doctor on Twitter, prescribing important medicine for unfortunate Twitterati who may not have access to the same, mainly Imodium.

Oh, and it’s not just Imodium.

The post may be a honorary one but the obvious political connections with this appointment are puzzling, but certainly not out of place in the context of Indian sport.

For now, the Union Minister needs to take a look at what happened the last time a singer decided to take a penalty at a World Cup.

Santosh Kashyap

After years of fighting relegation battles under Khalid Jamil, Mumbai FC opted for a new face in Santosh Kashyap at the beginning of the 2017 season, hoping that it would lift them from bottom-rung obscurity.

The 50-year old did manage a third-place finish with Royal Wahingdoh in the 2014-’15 season but his results at Air India, Mohun Bagan, Rangjadied United and Salgaocar FC would suggest otherwise.

At Mohun Bagan, he lasted just five matches while at Salgaocar, he reportedly picked up a tiff with the club’s chairperson Shivanand Salgaocar during a 3-0 loss to Sporting Clube de Goa.

This season started well with two wins for Mumbai FC but it all went downhill from there, the team not winning a single match afterwards and Kashyap clashing with the players, especially club captain Steven Dias, accusing the fans of having “poor upbringing” and repeatedly speaking of a top-three finish amidst the crisis.

After a 5-0 loss to DSK Shivajians, the club management decided enough was enough and Kashyap was shown the door. Mumbai FC, with four games to stave off relegation, might face the unique possibility of being dropping down two divisions at once should AIFF’s plan for a league re-structuring go through this year.

Colm Toal

On the face of it, a great signing. As the former technical director of the AIFF signed on for the same post at Minerva Punjab FC, club owner Ranjit Bajaj was ecstatic and exclaimed, “This is my best signing.”

Toal was the man who had an active role in the development of Gurpreet Singh Sandhu and Jeje Lalpekhlua among others but did not last long, as the Englishman had a fall-out with Bajaj regarding the latter’s alleged interference in matters such as team selection and quit a month into the job.

Sergio Farias

Brazilian Sergio Farias was hired as the replacement for Spaniard Cesar Farias in a bid to try to get Northeast United into the playoffs for the first time in their history. The ex-Juventus and Brazil Under-20 and U-17 coach bought a ton of experience with him, having coached the likes of Ronaldinho.

Having personally overseen a few signings, it came as a shock when Farias moved to Thai club Suphanburi less than two months later with the ISL season not even underway. Northeast United eventually replaced Farias with Portuguese Nelo Vingada.