INDIAN FOOTBALL FANS - A thinking to reprieve the spirit of Indian Football

For several years, the nation has watched foreign teams play high profile, high speed, exceptional skilful display of matches where Indian audiences have cheered their favourite European and other giants in World Cup's. They have cried when their favourite teams lost, they have skipped their dinner to catch a glimpse of their favourite stars in action. No doubt, Football is a 5400 seconds game of grit, passion, tenacity and adrenaline rush.
However, often the question is raised - when will we see an Indian jersey in action? When can we see an Indian player fight the likes of Ronaldo, Messi, and Ronaldinho? When can we see US among THEM?
If we go back to History, we did have a classy team, which did stand among the best (1950 - World Cup invitation, 1951 / 62 - Asian Games Gold medallist, 1956 -4th spot at the Olympics).

However, why are we so low ranked (153rd) today? Is it true that in a country of 1 billion plus, we can't produce one Zidane, one Ronaldo, and one Messi? We refuse to believe that. Cause if the endeavour to search for genuine fast bowlers in the scene of cricket (even few years back, we depended heavily on spinners as we had only few seamer's) could get us Ishant, Praveen, and others who struck fear among the Aussies and we could beat them on their soil, then we are sure, a correct approach and spirit can get us those talents who will stand among the rest of the worlds football stars. Our heroes will take the nation to that coveted position of playing in the World Cup. And beat the giants.

To a great extent, the media is to be blamed. Whereas a cricket player's family can be made into an article, the great news of India playing in SAFF Cup and beating their opponents emphatically doesn't make it to the print.
Of course, every housewife will dream of making her son the next Sachin. And Baichung, Sunil Chetri, NP Pradeep, Steven Dias... Who?

To change such a mentality, a revolution of thought and action was started on May 2007, on the social networking site Orkut. This revolution is called 'Indian Football Fans'. The community boasts of 3800 odd members and now, it sees an increase of 100 members after almost every 24 hours. This community, which is marked by a soccer ball with an Indian Flag, is the fore bearing of hardcore Indian Football Buffs, who decided to spread the fan base across the nation.
The news giants may not like to inform its readers about the scores and updates of Indian Football, but the fans are not denied the information as they are updated regularly through this community.

In the near future, the community will be seen actively participating in the real world, for the common cause it was given birth for, seeing Indian Jersey among the top stars of the world.

Shre Kumar Chatterjee is the founder of the Indian Football Fans forum on social networking site ORKUT