Live India, Love Football

During my first visit to India, my best friend and I visited the Rajasthan city, Udaipur, and planned on staying for just a few days. After 3 incredible days of taking in the beautiful lake, eating delicious Rajasthani cuisine, hanging out with locals and spending afternoons lounging on the city’s many sun soaked rooftops, we decided to cancel our bus tickets to Jaisalmer and leave a week later. In the end we had a blast and when our bus was finally leaving the station heading towards our next destination, I promised myself that I would one day return to this magnificent royal desert city. Now fast forward 6 years and I find myself on an overnight train from Delhi to Udaipur heading to scout the football talent and potential in a mining area just outside of the city. All I could picture was sitting on a rooftop, enjoying a drink and taking in the beautiful scenery of the city I fell in love with many years earlier. This moment didn’t happen till much after my train shoved its way ...

I woke up on Saturday morning and saw a message from my colleague, Raunak, informing me about a French Embassy hosted charity football tournament taking place at The British School in central Delhi. Since I knew that we didn’t have a team registered I wasn’t that interested in heading down there to just watch other past their prime people play football. Then he told me that the young girls from the YUWA India program would be there and playing in the men’s division and I knew that it was something I couldn’t miss. I’m so happy I took the trip down to the tournament. It was a perfect afternoon full of fun, food, football and the future. I ran into a number of friends down at the grounds and was simply amazed by how many people in Delhi are enjoying their weekends on the football pitch contributing to various charities while representing corporates and NGOs. The US Embassy even had a team and I realized that somehow or another I’m really missing out on a whole other side of Delhi ...

I spent the week in Bangalore a few weeks ago for meetings and to scout possible venues for the next set of FCBarcelona Soccer Camps. It was a great trip as I had the opportunity to travel all over this cool city to learn more about the grassroots football scene and check out existing infrastructure. The best part of the trip was spending time at the beautiful Bangalore Football Stadium. This centrally located stadium is equipped with artificial turf which was gifted to the Karnataka State Football Association through the FIFA “Goal” program. Better than looking at the stadium was learning about and experiencing the beauty of what was actually taking place on the pitch. Each day I was there, I had the opportunity to watch 50 young boys from underserved communities receive free training from the Dutch Academy (KNVB) and local Indian coaches. This is all was provided through  CSR initiative created by the Ozone group and supported on the ground by Bangalore Youth Football League....

A few months back I received an email from US Soccer President Sunil Gulati. Two professional football players who players who played in the now defunct WPS, Joanna Lohman and Lianne Sanderson, had gotten in touch with him seeking support with their plans to help the Indian women’s national team qualify for a FIFA World Cup. They had put together an ambitious proposal, aptly entitled JoLi clinics, and were interested in getting in touch with the All India Football Federation (AIFF) so they could begin preparations for their January 2012 JoLi clinics. I’m always happy to help out anyone interested in coming over to India to support the development of football over here, however, experience has shown me that only 10% of the people who say they are coming over “to help” actually do, especially when it’s on their own dime. However, going by the fact that they play professionally, they know Sunil and they had written a convincing email my hunch said that these women were pretty serious a...