Football; since its origin, has acquired fans in billions
and trillions across the planet. But still there exist countries across the
globe where the craze of football is not that significantly high. India can be
considered to be in the list of such countries. For the last few decades the
popularity of Cricket has dominated over the popularity of all other sports in
India. But it doesn’t mean that the population of India is not interested in
football. Although the popularity of cricket remains at the top but India has
football fans in millions.
In India football has attracted the attention of sports
lovers and has entertained them for ages and that is the reason why there are
football fans in India from different age groups. The older generation is nostalgic
about the past and The East Bengal – Mohun Bagan rivalry is a hot discussion
for them. The younger generation on the other hand is more interested in
European Football. They are more fascinated by the Madrid derby, Manchester
derby, Liverpool-United rivalry and the king of all rivalries, El Classico. But
this generation is not aware of the great legacy and the golden era of
Indian Football. The era when Indian Football ruled Asia – The past legacy of
Chuni Goswami, P.K. Banerjee, Tulsidas Balram, Neville D'Souza and Coach Syed Abdul Rahim remains buried somewhere in the
history and probably will remain buried forever. In this article I shall try to
dig out some of the historic events and put forward certain glimpses of the
Golden Era of Indian Football.
FOOTBALL IN INDIA : BACK TO THE ORIGIN
To trace the origin of football in India, we need to go back
to British Imperialism when India used to be a colony of the British Empire. In
the mid nineteenth century the British introduced football in India. It was a
means of recreation for the British troops stationed in India. For this specific
purpose, in 1888, the Durand Cup was founded, which is the third oldest
football competition in the world after FA Cup and Scottish Cup. Also in 1893
the IFA Shield was founded in Calcutta, the then capital of British-India. It
is the fourth oldest football trophy. Back then the British considered the
Bengali population of Calcutta to be physically weak. Hence the display of the
sport by the British troops was like a sign of superiority and dominance over
the Bengali population. These gestures hurt the sentiments of the people which
eventually gave rise to strong nationalist sentiments in Bengal. These
sentiments led to the formation of Mohun Bagan A.C.; it was a self-funded,
self-managed and most importantly self-motivated football club which would
challenge the British Imperialism in the football field.
The rise of Mohun Bagan reflected the nationalist sentiments
of the people and also represented the significant rise of outrage against the
British Raj. In its first few years Mohun Bagan expanded gradually with their
hard work. This hard work started paying off when the club won its first trophy
in 1904; The Cooch Behar Cup. In 1905 they successfully defended the trophy and
also bagged The Trades Cup and The Gladstone Cup. Their significant rise
attracted the attention of the British administration and they got invited to
compete in the IFA Shield in 1906. This tournament was strictly for the English
Teams and getting invited in it was a huge deal for a local Bengali team.
IFA Shield was not an easy tournament and Mohun Bagan in its initial years
suffered defeats after defeats which sent the message that the Mohun Bagan
would never match the levels of English footballers. But in 1911 this team made
history under the manager Shibdas Bahaduri. Mohun Bagan defeated clubs after
clubs and reached the finals where they faced East Yorkshire Regiment.
Mohun Bagan defeated East Yorkshire 2-1 in front of 60 thousand people and the
slogan “Vande Mataram” became a war cry in the stadium. Mohun Bagan had sent a
message to the masses that the British Imperialists were mere human beings and
the Indians could defeat them not only in a football field but in all aspects.
Mohun Bagan is the oldest existing football club of Asia.
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| MOHUN BAGAN 1911 IFA SHIELD WINNING SQUAD |
POST-INDEPENDENCE ERA UNDER SYED ABDUL RAHIM
The Indian football developed to a great extent during the
colonial rule and continued to develop after 1947 independence. In 1950 FIFA
World Cup, India had qualified as the other scheduled opponents withdrew. But
they refused to play pointing problems about lack of funds and less time for
preparation. More importantly India viewed the Olympics to be of more
importance than the FIFA World Cup. Post-independence era, from 1951 to 1962,
is considered as the golden era of Indian football, when India was probably the
best team in Asia. During this period the backbone of Indian football was Coach
Syed Abdul Rahim. Rahim is the best coach India had in its throughout football
history. He was an Indian version of a combined Pep Guardiola and Carlo Ancelotti
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| SYED ABDUL RAHIM |
Rahim had a unique way of managing the team, where he
not only focused on team management but also on man management. Rahim had successfully
created an environment of competitiveness in the squad. This made the players
to train harder and play better to secure their place in the playing eleven. Rahim’s
coaching career started back in 1943 where he managed Hyderabad City Police.
Rahim’s fame as a coach spread when his Hyderabad City Police defeated Mohun
Bagan in the Durand Cup finals in 1950. Soon he was appointed as the coach of
the national team and then began his conquest. Rahim straightaway won India a Gold
in the 1951 Asian Games where India defeated Iran 1-0. The goal scorer in the
final was Mewalal. India defeated both Indonesia and Afghanistan, 3-0, in
quarter-final and semi-final respectively and the goal scorers were Mewalal, Venkatesh
and Santosh Nandy. In the meantime from 1952 to 1955 India won the Quadrangular
Cup four times consecutively in Colombo, Burma, Calcutta and Dhaka respectively.
In the year 1956 India made history in the Melbourne
Olympics. This time India faced the host Australian team and defeated them 4-2.
That became a historic event as India became the first Asian football team to
reach the quarter-finals of Olympics. In that match Neville D’Souza scored a
hat trick which made him the first Asian to score a hat trick in Olympics. He
was the joint top scorer with 4 goals in 3 matches. India finished fourth which
was then the best performance by an Asian team so far in Olympics.
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| NEVILLE D’SOUZA |
ENTRY OF CHUNI GOSWAMI IN INDIAN FOOTBALL
In 1956 another wonder occurred to Rahim’s Indian football
team in the form of Chuni Goswami. Subimal Goswami popularly known as Chuni
Goswami was a sheriff of Kolkata who played as a striker as well as winger. He
captained both Mohun Bagan and Indian national team. In his prime from 1958 to
1964 he scored 9 very crucial goals in 30 FIFA ‘A’ international appearances. He
became the epicenter of Indian football and had a significant role in the India’s
conquest of Gold in 1962 Asian Games. Goswami was a Mohun Bagan legend. He won
3 consecutive Durand Cup with Mohun Bagan from 1963 to 1965. Goswami remained loyal to Mohun Bagan and didn't leave even after numerous offers from other clubs. An offer also came from the Spurs but Goswami didn't accept. He was awarded the Mohun Bagan Ratna in 2005
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| CHUNI GOSWAMI |
In 1962, Rahim was determined to win the Gold in the Asian
games. He created a front three which was going to rule the tournament. This front
three consisted to P.K. Banerjee, Chuni Goswami and Tulsidas Balaram. They
scored 9 goals in the tournament and 2 more were scored by Jarnail Singh. In
the first match of the group stage India lost to South Korea 2-0. But they soon
recovered against Thailand and Japan where they won 4-1 and 2-0 respectively
and completed second in the group stages after South Korea.
Then in the semi-finals India faced South Vietnam and
defeated them 3-2. Now India was all set to face South Korea in the finals and take
revenge for the 2-0 defeat in group stages. Before the finals Rahim requested
his team to fulfill his wish of winning the Gold medal. This turned out to be his
last wish as Rahim died a year later due to cancer. The team was hell bent to
fulfill the wish of their great mentor and they did the same by defeating South
Korea 2-1 and winning the Gold. Rahim’s wish was fulfilled and India’s conquest
for Gold was once again successful. But sadly this event marked the end of The
Golden Era of Indian Football under Coach Syed Abdul Rahim from 1951 to 1964.
On 11 June 1963, Rahim breathed his last and he took the
Golden Era along with him in his grave. India performed well in tournaments
after Rahim’s demise. They finished 2nd in the 1964 AFC Asian Cup.
But after that India failed to win a trophy or a gold medal. Even 1960 was the
last time when Indian football qualified in an Olympics and has failed to do so
after that.
Today Indian Football is developing under the leadership of
Sunil Chhetri. It is the dream of millions of Indians to see India play in the
FIFA World Cup. But it is true that the level of Indian Football back in the
Golden Era is still unmatched. It’s not that Indian football didn’t get players
who matched the caliber of P.K. Banerjee or Chuni Goswami rather the problem is
that India didn’t get a coach who could match the caliber of the great Syed
Abdul Rahim. Former Indian coach Alberto
Fernando during a workshop in Brazil said “What I learnt from Rahim
in 1956 is being taught now in Brazil. Verily, he was a football prophet.”
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