Official meeting between I-League and Fed Cup Committee at Football House

I-League and Federation Cup Committee official meeting was held recently at the All India Football Federation (AIFF) Headquarters Football House, Dwarka. A. R Khaleel was the chairperson of the meeting which was also attended by top officials and delegates that include Mr. Kushal Das, General Secretary, All India Football Federation; Mr. Subrata Dutta, Vice-President, AIFF; Mr. Ankur Datta, Deputy Chairman, I-League Committee and Mr. Sunando Dhar, Mr. Anupam Dutta, CEO, Indian Super League and Mr. Prasenjit Basu from Ten Sports along with Mr. Souter Vaz and Mr. Z.A Thakur.

AIFF’s venture and proposal of U-15 Tournament for I-League Clubs was much greeted with much applause by the Clubs. The inaugural edition of the Tournament will be held in the next year. This will be a 16 team event where besides the 10 I-League Teams, four other academies and two other AIFF Academies would be a part of the event. In the first edition 14 teams would be segregated into two groups and top three from each group would be joined by the two AIFF Academies in the final round. As per Kushal Das, the primary objective of the tournament is to enhance and endorse the talent for the 2017 FIFA World Cup. The venue and the schedule of the tournament of the Championship will be later intimated by AIFF after discussion with sponsor Coca Cola and marketing partner IMG – Reliance.

In a recent press meet, AIFF President Praful Patel had made it clear that AIFF will take every initiative to enhance the popularity of football all across the nation. More and more grassroots programmes will be introduced to make youth of the country even more interested in the sport. It was unanimously decided that the registration of Players would be done centrally through the State Associations and all ID Cards would be issued by AIFF.

Praful Patel profile as the President of AIFF has been quite relevant in the regards of development of the sport. He has always stressed that even though Indian Super League (ISL) has received remarkable response, yet I-League will always stand to be the principal league of the country. Patel has urged the clubs of ISL to participate and invest their interest in the reframing of the I-League.