They saw ISL and thought establishing a football club is as easy as setting up a locality chai shop.
Benaras doesn't have a field, no football culture, no fans. I doubt if the whole of UP have those. Yet they chose the city, and sunk their money.
I foresee this club will fold before their players set foot on the fields, unless they prolong the club's life a bit by operating from Kolkata or Delhi.
Taking risk comes with taking preparations. It's not that one morning you wake up and say "Let's start a tea shop, no, a property consultancy, no, ... a football club".
I on the contrary feel Banaras is a good place to start football. Believe it has potential. Few reason being from specific community/religion, area which is revered throughout India, a lot of bengali expatriates stay there, UP needs to start a footblling culture and has potential for growth. Maybe it will take time but it has potential there
I am pretty sure they have been working on this..you do not randomly pick a city like Banaras..there must be potential which they are trying to tap into..one of the most promising thing to happen in I league after Real Kashmir
I am pretty sure they have been working on this..you do not randomly pick a city like Banaras..there must be potential which they are trying to tap into..one of the most promising thing to happen in I league after Real Kashmir
True but Kashmir had fans I just am not sure about this place. If they are long term visional any place can be transformed into a sporting city. Unfortunately they will do what other Indian clubs do and that will not be sustainable.
Alternate decent options I thought was from Coimbatore where they had decent fans and stadium even when Chennai city FC was playing from there. Cities like Coimbatore have a good mix of kerala and tamilnadu football fans. It's a nice blend. You need some level of infrastructure and fans and then look to build your own infra. Now they have to play from Kashi or just withdraw and try next season. Simply throwing money to play this season makes no sense.
I am pretty sure they have been working on this..you do not randomly pick a city like Banaras..there must be potential which they are trying to tap into..one of the most promising thing to happen in I league after Real Kashmir
You think they have a plan? So why are they basing themselves in Varanasi when there are no turf there? Why register in Varanasi and playing from Lucknow? Now they cannot play from Lucknow even. Is that good planning?
Actually UP has footballing culture but it's limited to a few pockets like Gorakhpur, Meerut, Jhansi etc. Varanasi as such has no footballing history. I think they chose Kashi to cash 8n on Modi tag since he is MP from there, plus there is an international airport nearby. But a better place to operate would have been Gorakhpur as football is decently popular, it has footballing infrastructure and they could have tapped the talent and fans from across Bihar and I dare say, even Nepal. Nepalese ool do not require visa to cross the Gorakhpur border. In fact the entire Purvanchal region of UP is a footballing hotbed.
Finally, some good news to Indian football fans & players, mainly for the people like goalkeepar which is impacted due to age fudging.
AIFF is mandating TW3 test across all youth teams (U-10, U-12 & U-14) & it is mandatory even for state & district leagues. None of the tests are 100% accurate, but these things will definitely reduce age cheating.
They saw ISL and thought establishing a football club is as easy as setting up a locality chai shop.
Benaras doesn't have a field, no football culture, no fans. I doubt if the whole of UP have those. Yet they chose the city, and sunk their money.
I foresee this club will fold before their players set foot on the fields, unless they prolong the club's life a bit by operating from Kolkata or Delhi.
they chose that because entry fee for a 3rd tier city/town was less it would cost 5 crore and 3 crores to set-up team in major city
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We need risk takers..It has to start somewhere
Alternate decent options I thought was from Coimbatore where they had decent fans and stadium even when Chennai city FC was playing from there. Cities like Coimbatore have a good mix of kerala and tamilnadu football fans. It's a nice blend. You need some level of infrastructure and fans and then look to build your own infra. Now they have to play from Kashi or just withdraw and try next season. Simply throwing money to play this season makes no sense.
AIFF is mandating TW3 test across all youth teams (U-10, U-12 & U-14) & it is mandatory even for state & district leagues. None of the tests are 100% accurate, but these things will definitely reduce age cheating.