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INDIAN FOOTBALL : PAST AND PRESENT - by Ashok Kumar
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I saw Indian football both from the glorious past to the current scenario. My observations were that in those days players were a lot more hard-working than the present ones. But, I think the real issue is of technique and fundamental basics here.
Indians should first concentrate on 3 things:
1) When a player stops a ball running on the ground, it just stays there and under his control, like the Europeans & Latinos do. Many times we see on Indian matches, there is lack of total ball control.
2) When a player passes a ball (either on the ground or over someone's head) , he should know exactly what force and direction to apply so that the ball stops exactly where the player is, again like the foreigners do. (there is no approximation here; it should be exact).
3) When a player receives a ball. either through a ground pass or thru head/shoulder, he should stop it there itself, and the ball should be with him and should not move here and there.
I think, all current players and promising players should be first coached under a foreign coach, with emphasis on both techniques and fitness, as long as the players are good at the above 3 points.
For foreigners, especially in Germany, these things (they call it " first things first" -short pass and stop the ball right there, both in practice and actual match ----first step.) are taught over a period of 1 year.
In India, the football is very "unscientific"- simply hitting the ball here and there wont help. We should copy the Europeans and Latinos and learn the basics perfectly well.
Once this training is over, then a group of players who have learnt can take over the camp and start training other promising players, and over a period of say, one year, we can have 200 players who are good at basics. Now, the camp will continue. But, the players from the earlier batches will move on to the next level-
1) How to look at the opponent players, our players, and tackle at the same time.
2) How to have a group of 3 players (of the same team) within a range all the time so that they pass within themselves, while advancing with the ball. All this should be done under foreign coach, but the head of academy which coaches the players
will be Indian. There will be an Indian coach who will study the techniques of the foreign coach. Once the foreign coach moves out after 1 year, the Indian coach will take over.
The whole idea is to have a large group of players good at above 5 points. Then it will come in our genes and we can start aiming to qualify for world cup (through the Asian group). I have seen so many times in our matches- players passing the ball, and the team member losing control over the ball and it goes to the opponent player. This can't happen, if we want to qualify for world cup.
Well, these things should be implemented by a top team like Mohun Bagan, because they know more than others, they have the resources too. . Once our players understand the game like latinos & Europeans, it will become like cricket in India.
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