New Delhi: As stakeholders are unwilling, the All India Football Federation has dropped plans to organise the Federation Cup in September.
In its competition’s calendar for the 2025-26 season, the AIFF had earmarked September as the month to host the Fed Cup for the first time since 2017.
It had also tentatively pencilled in a September 1 to 20 slot for the tournament, just prior to the ISL and after the Durand Cup that will end on August 23.
But with the ISL looking for a mid September kick-off, the AIFF has received pushbike for the September date as it would hamper the preparations of clubs for the top-tier league.
With the 2025-26 AFC Champions League group stage matches beginning from September 15, ISL Shield champions Mohun Bagan will have additional workload to deal with.
Keeping all this in mind, the federation is now searching for alternate dates before the April window, where the Super Cup has been held for the past few seasons with little traction.
“We are now looking at a January window,” a person aware of the development told News9 Sports on Saturday.
In the last two seasons, the AIFF permitted six foreigners to be fielded in the playing XI but the move has failed to convince clubs to be at their full strength, despite an ACL 2 qualifying spot being up for grabs.
Odisha government picked up the tab for its last two editions that were held at Bhubaneswar’s Kalinga Stadium, with the 2023-24 edition held between January 9 to 28, but general interest and footfall in the stands was negligible.
All this had made the Kalyan Chaubey-led AIFF convinced of focusing on its initial plan of reviving ‘legacy tournaments’ but not much headway has been achieved so far.
Statistics
Insisting that he speaks with only “facts and figures” Chaubey resorted to a powerpoint presentation with multiple slides, pointing to the amount of work the AIFF had done in the last 2.5 years to lay the foundation for improved results in the future.
The former keeper also highlighted scoring woes as a result of reduced game time for Indian strikers in the ISL.
“Our main area of focus is the lack of goal scoring and the shortage of strikers. Anyone in Indian football will agree that is our major problem. One possible measure could be to allow less foreigners and thus give more space to Indian strikers,” he said.
But when asked if the AIFF plans to reduce number of foreigners from the ISL, he held up his hands, saying: “I am not in a position to comment. It depends on stakeholders. Happy to accommodate any decision taken by the stakeholder in this regard.”
With Manolo Marquez already informing of his preference to extend contract with FC Goa rather than taking over full-time as the national coach, the AIFF is in the lookout for a new coach though Chaubey chose not to speak much on the matter.
“I can’t say anything now as it will be discussed in the technical committee and the executive committee on June 29,” was his response.
With the clamour of Overseas Citizenship of India (OCI) players rising with each failed outing of the national team, Chaubey said discussions with the sports ministry has been encouraging and a list of 33 potential players have also been submitted.
“System changes don’t happen overnight and must be respected. The AIFF us committed to aligning with laws of the land and FIFA statutes and actively trying for inclusion of OCI players for the natiobal team to benefit from them,” he disclosed.
“The list of 33 OCI players were selected after talking to various stakeholders. Some of them have already got OCI card, some are willing to apply for it. The technical committee will be consulted when OCI players are available for selection.”
The AIFF had announced formation of a committee headed by Samir Thapar to look after the OCI issue in August 2023 but it is yet to hold a single meeting so far.
In its competition’s calendar for the 2025-26 season, the AIFF had earmarked September as the month to host the Fed Cup for the first time since 2017. Football Sports News: Latest Cricket News, Cricket Live Score, Sports Breaking News from Sports Today
