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The All India Football Federation (AIFF) Techinical Committee interviewed candidates for the Indian national team job and forwarded Igor Stimac's name for the post, snubbing former Bengaluru FC manager Albert Roca.
India are close to appointing a coach a full 115 days after Stephen Constantine announced his resignation following India's dismal performance in the 2019 AFC Asian Cup.
In those 115 days, India missed out on playing friendlies in the March international window and participated in the AFC U-23 Championship Qualifiers with a temporary coach, who failed to guide the team to the next stage.
The first task for the new coach would be to steer India to victory in the 2019 King's Cup in Thailand. The four-day tournament begins on June 5, where the Blue Tigers will play two international matches.
The Technical Committee opted for Stimac ahead of Roca as the Croatian was personally present in New Delhi for his interview. Moreover, Stimac's salary of $25,000 was at least $10,000 lesser than Roca's. The other candidates in the fray were Sweden's Hakan Ericson, and South Korea's Lee Sung-min.
In this article, we present 3 reasons why Roca would have been the right man for the job.
#3 Comes from a Spanish background
Right from the first season of ISL when Antonio Lopez Habas led ATK to the 2014 ISL triumph, India has seen a major overhaul in the style of play and tactics deployed. The Spanish style of play where the team holds the ball, passes it around, and spreads out the opponents to hit them has worked wonders.
In the 2018-19 season of the ISL, 4 of the 10 managers were Spanish including the finalists, Bengaluru FC and FC Goa. Even in the I-League, the runners-up East Bengal had Spanish personnel and winners Chennai City FC had five foreigners in the ranks and played out from the back.
Fans were annoyed when Stephen Constantine helmed India because he deployed the long ball tactic and over-relied on Sunil Chhetri when there were players in the country who could pass it around and play a brilliant attacking brand of football.
Coming from the La Masia background and having been the conditioning coach, as well as the assistant coach of Barcelona in some matches, Albert Roca knows how to bring the best out of the Indian players by playing the brand of football the country requires. His experience in Spain would have been an invaluable asset for the team.
#2 Coached a senior national football team before
Managing a club and leading a national team side are two very different things. You don't have the luxury of having foreigners in your team but you can pick anyone having an Indian passport in your squad.
Albert Roca had previously managed El Salvador and took them to the Third Round of the 2018 FIFA World Cup Qualifiers, something which India has never been able to achieve before.
Igor Stimac might hold a slight advantage over Roca in this department as he led Croatia to the FIFA World Cup. But, one ought to note that Croatia are regulars in FIFA World Cup and the Qualifiers should have been a cakewalk for them but rather they made it through by the skin of their teeth, occupying the last spot in the ranking of second-placed teams.
#1 Highly familiar and tasted success in Indian football
All three of Igor Stimac, Hakan Ericson, and Lee Sung-min are totally alien to Indian football, having never stepped foot in the country before. Stephen Constantine helmed India after a gap of 10 years and a lot of things changed in those years with a majority of the players whom he coached before hanging up their boots.
Constantine was given the job in the year of the World Cup Qualifiers and by the time he got the opportunity to get familiar with the players, India had already been shown the exit door.
Albert Roca's last professional game as a manager of Bengaluru FC was on 20th April where his side defeated East Bengal to clinch the 2018 Super Cup. Having coached a lot of Indian national team regulars like Sandesh Jhingan, Sunil Chhetri, Gurpreet Singh Sandhu, and Udanta Singh, who form the backbone of the team, Roca can bring out the best from the Indian players.
Albert Roca is one of the most highly successful coaches in Indian football in recent times. Appointing him as the coach would have been a step forward for Indian football.
