Déjà vu for Indian football fans as road to 2027 AFC Asian Cup ends in despair

There were two developments in the football landscape on Tuesday – at different parts of the globe but which rubbed the Indian fan the wrong way.

The first one was that of Cape Verde, a mere dot in west Africa becoming the second smallest country ever to qualify for the FIFA World Cup next year while late in the evening, the Blue Tigers’ hopes of making the cut in the 2027 AFC Asian Cup came down crashing.

 While saluting Cape Verde, whose players are drawn from the diaspora in France, Portugal and Netherlands, the all-too-familiar lament was back in the Indian media as well as the social media landscape. For those of us who made a living by being a chronicler of the misery of Indian football for decades, it was déjà vu time once again.

What certainly hurts is that this time, the national team has even failed to make it to the 24-team continental affair after two back-to-back appearances.

 Thankfully, one is yet to come across any severe trolling of new coach Khalid Jamil, whose debut tournament at the CAFA Cup last month saw the Blue Tigers record a podium finish despite playing higher ranked opponents.

The warning signals were, of course, there as none of the attackers could score a goal in Turkmenistan in four matches while they had to bank on a shootout against Oman in the third place play-off game.

2027 Asian Cup: At 40, fighting fit Chhetri ready to carry a billion hopes

It was sheer ineptness in front of the goal had been the bugbear of India’s campaigns for close to two years – as many as three coaches have been on the job (Igor Stimac, Manolo Marquez and now Jamil) but failed to find a remedy.

The retrograde step of bringing back a 40-year-old Sunil Chhetri from retirement only highlighted the shortcoming and the fourth highest scorer in international football must be ruing his decision to put on the boots again.

‘’Not even Pep Guardiola or Jose Mourinho could do more than this,’’ the plain speaking Stimac had famously said when India failed to qualify for the 2022 FIFA World Cup in Qatar.

In the last cycle, there was a realistic opportunity to make the third round of the 2026 Qualifiers but the goals simply dried up – which culminated in the AIFF making a scapegoat of the Croatian by sacking him but eat the humble pie by paying through their nose as compensation for breach of contract.

Now that a ticket to the World Cup is a bridge too far (despite the introduction of 48 teams from next edition), a ticket to the Asian Cup acts as the face saver but the balance sheet of the ongoing campaign had been nothing short of a disaster.

Just ponder – all three other teams in the group: group toppers Hong Kong, Singapore and Bangladesh are lower ranked than India but the later are languishing at the bottom with no wins from four matches with two draws and losses each. Worse still, a goal-differential of minus two.

Sunil Chhetri's (blue) recall had been an ill-advised move

One remembers an interaction with Stimac around four years back on ‘Who after Sunil?’ and the decorated coach stressed on the need of employing Indian strikers in Number Nine role in the Indian Super League (ISL).

The thinking was to develop homebred goalscorers who could take on the rival defence and be good in the air to provide the breakthroughs – but then – one can’t issue a directive to the team owners who bankroll the teams and would want success at any cost.

The bigger picture, meanwhile, is even more dismal. It’s convenient to lay the blame on the doors of the current dispensation at the AIFF but the rot goes much deeper and way back in time than just that.

The ISL, while doing some window dressing to the game in the country and creating a bunch of overpaid footballers, has devalued all other time-tasted tournaments and the footballing culture of the country as a whole.

Add to this is the lack of aspiration – best exemplified by Mohun Bagan Super Giants’ reluctance to venture to Iran for AFC Champions League 2 and test themselves against a tougher challenge.

Call me a naysayer, but the story of Indian football will continue to be that of one step forward, two steps back!