In late nineteenth century, Sovabazar Athletic became the first Indian club to win a football tournament (Trades Cup in 1892). Over the next few decades, teams from Kolkata challenged the colonial supremacy which till then prevailed massively in the tourneys organized in and around the region. From the vividly talked about 1911 IFA Shield Final to Mohammedan Sporting lifting the Durand Cup in 1936, it would be safe to infer that there have been diverse ways in which the beautiful game has been remembered by the masses in lndia over the years.

The idea of this sport as a spectacle which projects competition, agony, success and failure offer us the perfect backdrop upon which to look deeply into human nature and create ecosystem that transcends sport itself. Through the same the Kolkata derby and Mohammed Salim’s tryst with Scottish football has been iconized.

However, if one were to recollect the single most talked about event in the history of the game here, it would have to the ‘no-show’ of the national team at the 1950 World Cup. The FIFA organized event after all, is the pinnacle of sport, a zenith that every football player aspires to be a part of. The unavailability, comes back to haunt us even more as over the next 60-odd years we have never managed to come remotely close to making it through the qualifying stages.

People often wondered how the second largest country in the world in terms of population was never represented at any of the FIFA events; why was it that we never managed to put together a team which would compete at the biggest spectacle that is there in sports.

In December 2013 though, the game’s governing body, perhaps enthused by the AIFF’s continued efforts to promote the game and exuberance to host an event of the highest order announced the 17th edition of the FIFA U-17 World Cup would be hosted the proverbial ‘sleeping giants of world football.’

A little more than two years later, today, a full fledged delegation from Zurich initiated their first inspection of the provisional venues here in Kochi. Led by the FIFA Head of Events, Jaime Yarza, they will also visit Goa, Navi Mumbai, Kolkata, Guwahati and New Delhi. Seemingly pleased by what he witnessed, the Spaniard mentioned in an interaction afterwards, “It’s pretty good (about the arrangements), however there are a host of improvements that this stadium and others would have to undertake to be finalized by FIFA as a World Cup venue.”

Accompanied by Tracy Lu, Vijay Parthasarathy and Felipe Restrepo of Competitions, Christina Hollerl of Marketing, Jochen Steinhoff of Media, Paul Calder of TV, Jean Pierre Koeltgen of Ticketing and Shaji Prabhakaran, FIFA’s Development Officer here, the team went on to oversee the other practice pitches too.

Here’s hoping they return content with the infrastructural development and the tournament grows to be the best youth event in the history of the sport,because as Yarza and others acknowledged earlier today, no other event can place us as firmly as this one amongst the football following aficionados of the world.

(Report & Photo courtesy AIFF Media)