Now, a panel to monitor Indian football team's progress

New Delhi: The All India Football Federation (AIFF) has set-up a committee to monitor the progress of the Indian national team as part of it’s preparation for the 2011 Asian Cup, Qatar.

India qualified for the premier Asian competition last year by winning the AFC Challenge Cup in August 2008. Since then, India has played just a single friendly last month where they disappointingly lost 2-1 to Hong Kong. India have fallen six places below and are ranked 148.

Coach Bob Houghton has been stressing the need to play more international friendlies time and again but it has fallen on deaf ears.

In the AIFF executive committee meeting on Thursday, it was decided that a committee comprising of one of it’s members, former national team and current JCT coach Sukhwinder Singh, three vice-presidents of the federation and Bob Houghton and Colin Toal shall be it’s members.

The committee took some other decisions as well:

The AIFF has approved the criteria for hosting various National Championships. Following are the criteria

• Availability of the minimum infrastructure at the tournament venue on the dates given in the AIFF calendar. This will depend on the category of the tournament.
• Climatic conditions
• Safety and security of the participating players and officials

Once these criteria’s are established and found in order, the following criteria can be followed to allot the tournament

• Ability of the organisers to hold the tournament based on the past record.
• Facilities provided at the venue to the participating teams, match officials and media.
• Support of local government/administration for hosting the event
• Special occasion or any other exceptional reason for hosting the event
• AIFF also changed the format of the Sub Junior Nationals. Given below are the criteria’s
• Prior to the selection of the state team it is suggested that as many schools and clubs as possible be involved in the selection process. This can be done by holding competitions for them or by getting students from different schools involved in the selection process.
• To enable teams to play more matches it is suggested that the participants will be divided in four groups. Proximity of teams from each of the match venue when the groups are formed.
• Depending upon the number of participating states the groups will have 6-8 teams. The top two teams from each group will qualify for the final round. The winners and the hosts of the final round will be automatic qualifiers. Therefore there will be ten teams in the final round divided into two groups of five teams each.
• Plan for preparation of India team for the Olympic qualifiers, Asian Games qualifiers and AFC Asian Cup was discussed. A small committee will be formed to plan and monitor the national teams preparation for the AFC Asian Cup 2011.

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