#TFGtake -- Visa issues cancelling India U-17 tour to USA is yet another example of our football administrators' incompetence

THIRD TIME LUCKY? Not so much when it comes to Indian football teams. 

Last year, the senior Indin national football team was supposed to go on a tour of USA to play a few club sides and a couple of international friendlies against Latin American national teams. The trip was meticulously planned out by head coach Stephen Constantine who wanted the players to have the exposure to different styles of play and climates, and wanted some US club agents to take a look at some of our young players. But that was all thrown into the drain because the tour clashed with the ISL pre-season and the franchises were not ready to give up their players for national duty (unless they were forced into it by FIFA regulations, as was the case during World Cup Qualifiers).

Then, earlier this summer, Constantine planned yet another tour of the USA, this time for the India U-23 team that is targeting the Asian U-23 Championship. Playing in USA against club sides would give the players some international experience and maybe some players would catch the eyes of scouts, the gaffer thought.

But nope. Lightning struck his plans a second time when the entire tour got cancelled again, allegedly due to VISA issues. An AIFF source told TFG that even though the Federation had submitted all the applications on time and arranged the paperwork, the American embassy never called them for the interview. 

The U-23 team went to Singapore instead to play preparatory friendlies, where the conditions and level of competition are nothing like the ones they would have gotten at the USA.

It was unfortunate that the Indian U-23 national team players had to cancel their tour simply due to visa issues. A national sporting federation, which is managing teams that is representing the nation, should be more competent at this; it's their responsibility to make sure our boys' preparations don't get hampered. There's also the issue of the national team's passage being denied being an insult to the entire country.

But maybe this was an anomaly. Maybe the situation caught the AIFF team managers unprepared. It's not like they've had to arrange USA visas any time in the near past. This would be a tough lesson for them in international travel management, and next time they would go to all sorts of extra lengths to make sure this would never happen again. Right?

Wrong. Just today, Times of India reported that yet another national team has had its USA tour cancelled due to visa issues. This time, it's the India U-17 team that will become part of history coming October when it plays in the FIFA U-17 World Cup, the first Indian football team of any age group to play at that level.

And guess who they are playing their first match against? None other than the USA. None other than Indian-born businessman Sunil Gulati, who is the president of United States Soccer Federation as well as one of the FIFA Vice-Presidents, was present in New Delhi when the FIFA U-17 World Cup draw was held, where his country of birth and his present homeland were sorted into the same group. Heck, he even joked about wanting to see India and USA play each other on the first day of the World Cup, and that's exactly what turned out to be the case. And that made it even more important for India to play the USA team in a preparatory friendly. 

Subsequently, US Soccer Federation approved the India U-17 tour of USA. So when AIFF went about trying to arrange visa for the tour, they had an official invitation from US Soccer, the diplomatic weight of a World Cup event to underline the importance of this tour, and the experience of a denial of visa in the near past to better inform their application procedure. But none of that was enough. Once again, the call for visa interviews never arrived, and the tour had to be cancelled.

Third time lucky? You wish.

Denying visa to athletes is nothing new for USA. Not long ago, a Delhi-based Tibetan womens' football team was denied visa. Then two Kashmiri athletes suffered the same fate earlier this year. The visa rules have tightened further after Donal Trump came to power, and this is a political reality that any person or group of individuals seeking entry into USA has to deal with. But the Indian national team isn't just any team: it's a squad that directly represents the country, its sporting culture and the millions of fans, and therefore has to be treated as such. The failure on the US Embassy's part to recognize that cannot be denied. At the same time, it's not like AIFF were entirely powerless to do something about it.

 The Federation is well aware of the potential USA holds for Indian players. Constantine has spoken again and again how beneficial it would be for Indian players if they managed to land a contract with one of the lower division clubs in that country. On top of that, AIFF have IMG-Reliance as their commercial partners; and IMG are a major partner with US Soccer Federation and Major League Soccer as well. 

Add to the fact that at a government level, football is becoming more and more important with each passing week. Prime Minister Narendra Modi has been talking about football in multiple events. The Union Sports Minister Vijay Goel has been attending multiple Mission XI Million Festivals - a grassroot level buildup for the FIFA U-17 World Cup - in different parts of the country. When the top politicians of the country are engaging with the U-17 World Cup so intimately, how come the very players who will represent us are getting their preparations hampered in this fashion? Why wouldn't the central government, who are evidently keeping a close watch on the Indian football landscape, anticipate further problems when the India U-23 team was denied visa and step in to ensure the same thing did not happen to our maiden World Cup team? And since AIFF have a close ear of the central government for the first time in history, why wouldn't they alert them about the special diplomatic help they would likely need after being burned the first time?

This is a failure on many levels for Indian football. The AIFF, the central government... none of them really stepped up to go the extra mile. And IMG-Reliance, who have proved themselves to be excellent organizers with the ISL and the recent scheduling of friendlies for the Indian national team, are happy to focus their efforts on the upcoming ISL, without sparing any added effort for the India U-17 team as AIFF's commercial partners. 

All the major custodians of Indian football are viewing the FIFA U-17 World Cup event as a standalone platform to reap benefits from. That's why India's matches were moved to Delhi at the government's request: the politicians want to be able to show their faces on TV during those historic and high-TRP matches. The AIFF and IMG-Reliance top brass will undoubtedly do the same, and perhaps use the event to promote the next season of ISL. But the sending the team to USA for preparations does not serve any of those objectives. 

But to be frank, the time and effort AIFF have put in behind this Under-17 team is unprecedented. For more than 2 years now, the squad has stayed and trained together, and toured multiple countries in Europe and Asia to prepare for the big task ahead. Which is why it's even more surprising why after doing such a great job AIFF would allow all that effort to be soured by this black dot of back to back failures regarding USA visas. 

Getting sorted into a tough group at the World Cup was bad enough. Not many are hoping for India U-17 to actually win any of their matches in the Group Stage. But if playing a strong opponent in a friendly before the actual tournament helps them in any way to increase the chances of them putting up a strong fight at the big stage, our boys deserve every bit of that opportunity. And getting that chance cut short due to visa issues is heart-breaking for the players and fans alike.

Again, if this was an isolated incident, this would have been less of an issue. But having 3 tours of USA dismissed within a year, and two of them due to visa issues just weeks apart from each other, leaves no room for excuse. Not for AIFF, and not for the government.

Would this happen to an Indian cricket team?

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