Mumbai: Indian football team head coach Stephen Constantine believes that the main coaching staff of the national team needs to be given control of the junior sides as well, in order for football to progress in the country.
Speaking on the sidelines of the senior national team’s training camp in the Andheri Sports Complex, in Mumbai, Constantine spoke in favour of a system where the senior national team coach takes control of the national sides across all age groups.
“The national coach should lead all the national teams. And I mean lead in terms of philosophy, selection of coaches, methodology, everything,” said Constantine on Saturday, before the national side’s departure for Phnom Penh, where India are scheduled to take on Cambodia in an international friendly next week, before they travel to Malaysia for their Asian Cup third round Group A qualifiers.
“Now, you get the argument that what happens if they (coaches) are sacked? What happens with the u-17s is that they are getting to learn different systems anyway,” explained Constantine. The 54-year-old went on to cite Malaysia as an example of this model, where German coach Gerd Zeise and his support staff look after the national teams across all age groups.
“I think a classic example is Myanmar. They just qualified for the u-20 World Cup on merit. Their average age is about 24 in their senior national team, and they’ve had their coach there for the last eight years.
Constantine also stressed the importance of scouting talented players across the country, for the different age groups.
“We need to go out and find them, we need to scout them (young players). It’s a process,” he said. “We are now watching the Santosh Trophy. We have players in the u-21 that will qualify for the u-22 team.”
The Englishman also made it clear that the Indian football clubs should have a stronger scouting system.
“Ideally you want the clubs to be scouting the players. Then we can scout the teams. Not the national team scouting the players for the clubs. It should be the other way round,” he said.
‘Aizawl FC are the Leicester City of India’
The 24-member Indian national team squad was announced on Saturday evening. However, none of the players from the high-flying Aizawl FC made it to the squad.
Aizawl were relegated to I-League II last season, before being promoted back to the I-League due to the pull-out of Goan clubs like Salgaocar FC and Sporting Clube de Goa.
Now, the team from Manipur are sitting pretty atop the I-League table, ahead of giants like East Bengal, Mohun Bagan, and Bengaluru FC. Constantine praised the Manipuri club, saying: “As a team they’ve played very well. We can say that they are the Leicester City of India.”
However, he revealed that he did not pick any player from Aizawl, as he did not want to disturb the balance of the national side.
“I have experimented over the last two years. But I don’t need to do that now. I have a group of players that I’m comfortable with. For somebody to come in, they need to be better than what I have – not the same as. I wish them (Aizawl) well. I’m sure there will be players in the future that catch the eye,” he concluded.
India squad:
Goalkeepers: Subrata Paul, Gurpreet Singh Sandhu, TP Rehneesh.
Defenders: Pritam Kotal, Nishu Kumar, Sandesh Jhingan, Arnab Mondal, Anas Edathodika, Dhanpal Ganesh, Fulganco Cardozo, Narayan Das, Jerry Lanrinzuala.
Midfielders: Jackichand Singh, Udanta Singh, Eugeneson Lyngdoh, Milan Singh, Md. Rafique, Rowllin Borges, Halicharan Narzary, CK Vineeth.
Forwards: Jeje Lelkephlua, Sunil Chhetri, Daniel Lalhimpuia, Robin Singh.
