This is not to say that ISL will not be successful. With the kind of money that will be spent and the organization be there, ISL will be mightily popular and overtake I-league by a mile. On the contrary, success (measured by popularity only, nothing else) of ISL will impart more problems than solutions to Indian football.
Apart from player burnouts, fixture congestion and other related knots, eyeballs will be attracted only ISL, and I-league and even the national team games will be deemed less glamorous (dark-skinned malnutritioned guys walking around the park with footballs under sun and absence of cheerleaders definitely is not very eye pleasing -- even if they play against foreign teams) and will be skipped. So the interest will plummet.
In cricket, only IPL guarantees full house, none other. And IPL is driving BCCI. In football's case, this will not be so, because AIFF will get only Rs 30 Lakhs for the next 7-8 years. It will give bare sustenance only. Not a windfall really.
Two leagues cannot run simultaneously. ISL cannot be enlarged gradually at the cost of I-league shrinking, because during the consolidation period, we will lose AFC slots etc. The two leagues CANNOT be merged, as the basic setups are vastly different (there cannot be 3 teams from Kolkata -- ADK, EB, MB. And none will agree to play out of Siliguri. EB/ MB won't like to be taken over by ADK. Same problem in Goa).
Solution could have been mixing the two leagues in one go, in one season. Keep top 8 teams of I-league (in terms of attendance), get 8 more franchisee teams. Give a new name to the league (League One India? Thok Denewala League?). Stop promotion/ relegation for say 5 years.
In other words, REVAMP I-LEAGUE, not create confusion by a parallel league. But nobody will care because this plan gives less scopes for profit generation and money laundering to the promoter, so ...
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@Sunbha123 athletico Kolkata have 2 African internationals aged 24 and 28
U miseed to mention them